Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Ivan Beaver]

So an interesting development has cropped up. I've managed to find a local selling 4 LABs already assembled using the Eminence drivers. Problem is, he doesn't have an asking price and he wants me to give him an opening offer. He seems to be flexible on the price judging from the email I received, but I'm not really sure what one of these would be worth outside of the value of the parts and materials alone. I don't want to lowball him, but at the same time I don't want to offer way too much and screw myself over. Any ideas?

Consider that the "average" labsub (varying a lot depending on the construction and finish-handles-wheels etc) is around $1,000-not counting labor-that would be a start.

[Taylor Hall]

From a business stand point, I'd not invest any money in gear that only goes out once a year.  Excess capacity is infinitely expensive.

I just noticed that one of my previous posts got some info left out when I had to retype it after Firefox crashed. We actually gained a couple rentals for our full system through some local DJs so we actually have a "legitimate" cause to pick these up as they will let us flex quite a bit more muscle sound-wise over what we have now. Between those shows and the other convention that we rent to we will completely recoup the total cost before the end of the year. All we're waiting on is for our money person to OK it and with any luck we'll have four new (to us) LABs sitting in our storage facility ready to melt some faces.

[Rick Powell]

Most sellers of LAB subs have a hard time getting $1000 apiece for them; even though they may be put together well, there's that "no brand name" and question of "what's inside the box" build quality, as well as its size and weight making it undesirable for a large segment of would-be sub cabinet buyers.  I have seen some units that I know were well built go for just north of $600 or so.  They are an insane bargain at that price, if the build quality is there and you are capable of hauling them.  OTOH, you'd have no trouble selling a JBL SRX 728 for $1k.

[Taylor Hall]

We're going to inspect them tonight to be sure everything's in order. If all goes well we'll be picking them up this weekend.

[Taylor Hall]

Well, things were not well with the subs. Two drivers were kaputt (one blown coil and one needing a recone) and a couple of the cabs were banged up to the point that the casters had been ripped off.

We tried talking the guy down but he wouldn't budge from his initial price even after seeing that the stuff was clearly wrecked. We got a feeling that there was more to this deal than met the eye so we walked away from it. So word of warning to anyone who sees 4 LABs surface in the Duluth, GA area, they're not kosher.

It wasn't a total loss as we had a backup plan in place so we used the truck we had rented to go pick up a bunch of ply from home depot and got to cutting that same afternoon. We should have a completed box by this wednesday once the drivers come in. They won't be LABs, but they'll get the job done for what we need and at significantly less than what we would have spent for a set of derelict LABs.

[Sean Hennessey]

a lab 12 is prettty cheap.  IDK, might have still taken it if the price was  right.  if one had a blown coil and the other a trashed cone, then I would say they both needed a recone (reconing replaces the VC as well, as far as an eminence recone kit is concerned)

[Ivan Beaver]

a lab 12 is prettty cheap.  IDK, might have still taken it if the price was  right.  if one had a blown coil and the other a trashed cone, then I would say they both needed a recone (reconing replaces the VC as well, as far as an eminence recone kit is concerned)

One of the big problems with the lab sub-is that many get built by people who have never built a cabinet before and do a poor job-or they try to "improve" on the design-yet they have no knowledge of what they are going and simply guess.  NOT the way to design a horn.

So the quality of construction varies from excellent to piss poor and the product not performing anywhere near what it should.

Are there are any air leaks?-poor joints that buzz?-lack of bracing-inadequate seal around the driver and so forth.  That can make a big difference on how well it actually performs-and you can't tell those types of things from looking at the outside of the cabinet.

[Taylor Hall]

There were several joints for the horn vent that were showing significant amounts of daylight and one cab looked like it had been "fixed" after they realized something was way off. We also noticed when examining the drivers that the plates covering the two that were blown had no adhesive left to their seal while all the others did. He knew these things were blown and was just going to pass it on to the next owner without even telling them on top of all the other little things.

Had he been up front about what damage had been done to these cabs then this likely would have ended differently. He obviously wasn't expecting anyone to show up with a voltmeter and screwdriver and half a head of sense. Could we have fixed the drivers? Yes, easily. Could we have fixed the cabinets? Debatable. There were a lot of little things that were obvious and easy fixes, but like Ivan said without being able to see the entirety of the inside we have no clue how well the rest of the box was built and we weren't willing to gamble on something like that when we could build our own for only a bit more than he was asking.

[Richard Turner]

If you are dead set on building them I would seriously  consider getting quotes from a couple professional commercial cabinet shops to do the cutting.

A shop with a real panel saw could probably cut the  4 kits out in a half day/ 6 hours, maybe a bit longer if you wanted the  routering and boring done for the speaker mounts baffles and side covers done even at $70 an hour its still cheaper than wasting a piece of 18mm birch with a mis cut and they would likely be better on price of the materials than you would ever get from a hardware store by special order as well as they may already have some offcuts on hand  that work out .

You will save money by hiring a professional to do the cutting. trust me on that


as far as a front loaded tuned port dual 18 box, dont waste your effort time or money on it there are far too many used name brand boxes to be bothered with it, unless you are willing to own the homebrew box forever and ever it will be worthless to sell, as in pull the raw drivers out sell them and burn the box when you're done where a used jbl/eaw/yorkville/mccauley, dare i even say peavey box will always have some worth on the used market.

Heck a peavey QW218 sub has street price of ~$1200 has a nice finish ( you do realise nice texturelac, gatorguard, truckbed liner etc finish for the home brew box runs about $100 a gallon plus clean up/shop supply costs) and 5 year warranty if you register it and use a crest/ peavey amp ( I forget the specifices on the extra 2 years) but those amps you have would be in the red anyway pushing a dual 18 sub anyway they just dont have enough stuff inside,

Realistically even adding in a new amp, lets look at the peavey stuff, have it open on a national large MI retailer, IPR7500dsp street price ~$1000, CS4080HZ ~$1200 both rated 2KW @ 4ohm

plus they are offering 24 month interest free financing to qualified buyers

so have a look at those numbers, factor in 5 year warranty, capital cost depreciation on the gear vs your tax situation, etc etc,

I'm up in Canada very heavily taxed as individuals but as for businesses we get to write off sales tax paid on new equipment (but have to charge it on deporeciated out used equipment sold off at selling price) 15% depreciation first year(half year) then 30% of depreciated value each subsequent year, so basically after 5 years the piece is worth 20% according to the accountant yet is usually worth half of new in real life so needless to say best plan is to sell it half of new with a few months warranty remaining, customer happy with piece of mind of bit of warranty remaining, Seller(me) happy that if they take it and run the ba!!s off of on first night out and destroy it I'm not on the hook for selling bunk gear, I let the warranty cliams dept explain burned black voice coils on tweeters aren't warranty covered.

[ProSoundWeb Community]