How dirty cheap are you?

[frederic]

Anyone else a packrat? I have saved little pieces of wire

Frederic <--- maximus, packratimous, monkeyous.

a broken 4 channel mixing console
4000 feet of small pieces of wire
2- 12" speakers that are busted
1- 4" tweeter (busted also)

In my garage I have about 20,000 feet of cat 5 cable, 6,000 feet of 24-ch TRS snake cable (which I will use some of as soon as the walls are up, and I can find help humping the 4' diameter wooden spools up 2 flights of stairs), and about 4 miles of 12-ch fiber optic cable (which will become lightpipe snakes!). Oh, the good fiber thats actually glass, not plastic like the circuit city toslink cables.

screws that someone threw in the trash

I never have the right screws, but I have boxes of unsorted screws. Probably a full-size pickup truck bed's worth. When I was ripping out the old studio, I saved even more screws. The nails I chucked since they were bent. I'm perfectly good at bending my own nails thank you.

a guitar with a broken neck
a guitar with no guts

But that might be useful, you might make new guitars by purchasing a bolt-on neck. (grin)

dual well casette recorder (one side dosnt work)
3 pair of broken headphones [/B]

I have a few of those too. Coincidentally, all the dead decks are ratshack or onkyo. At least the tascam decks I have work fine.

I have an akai cassette deck that a friend of mine cleaned the head with brake cleaner (I did say white can, in the garage, third shelf).

Oiy.

 

[OnTheBlackRock]

one of my ghetto creations...

I was having echo problems in a room and I took pvc piping and made a 6' tall outline box with it then draped thick quilts over all four sides and it was a GREAT vocal booth... and highly colapsable and you can even throw it in the shed in the backyard when you dont use it here's a diagram>

 

[frederic]

Of course you all realize the first guy daring enough to admit he stuffed his studio with dead opposum, dried grass, newspapers and his wife's old underwear (as insulation of course) is going to win the "I'm the cheapest of the dirty cheap" contest.

C'mon, identify yourself.

 

[Beatnik]

I think that guy's studio has already burned down because of all the fire-hazards stuffed in his walls

 

[Jblount]

Yes, Fredric has the title of worlds packiest pack rat! You are worse than I am. lol.

 

[alien]

The thread titled "My Hole In The Wall" shows a pretty good array of equipment for a homestudio.

Here's how i did it making less than $30K a year.

For starters, I am a pro-audio repair tech as well as a bio med tech. This came in handy.

The amps were both given to me as they had both gone boom. About $40 worth of parts in each and VOILA! studio amps!
The console was pulled from a casino and a smoking enviroment too. It originally retailed for $3995. I got it for $350. It took two cans of D5, alot of Windex, and almost a full roll of solder, but I got her running again. I had to drop every board and inspect it with a magnifying glass for cracked solder joints, clean every pot, disassemble each fader to clean and lubricate them, clean every jack, and so on. It took about a week working almost all night every day.
The Quadraverb was bought for $15. It the input/output controls had been smashed in. The PC board was broken into four pieces. I bridged the broken traces and used two part epoxy to glue the board back together.
The midi EQ had a bad buffer to the main memory chip as well as a dead battery.
The Omnifex delay was a trade for a Nativity In Black CD.
The patch bay was $12 on eBay.
The studio monitors were $50 from a pawn shop.
The Tascam tape/cd deck was $15 from eBay. He posted no pic and I took the risk...it paid off.
The Symetrix 455 line mixer was pulled from a local Red Lobster and scrapped cuz the phantom power was inop. A $700 for free lol.
The Yamaha dual 31 band EQ was a clean & repair job that was never picked up. I had to clean it all over again as it had sat on the shelf unused for over a year.
The computer was a $30 case. The power supply was a cheap buy from a friend who bought a good case, but wanted a lighted power supply. The mainboard, 1.2GHz cpu, memory was a combo deal from eBay for $60. Each drive cost me about $50. The SCSI controller card was $30.
I made ALL cables with the exception of two instrument cables and a few mono rainbow patch cables.
The carpet on the floor is three different colors, but was free from a local thrift store.
All baseboards and stripping were cheap 1X4's and 1X3's.
The studio was originally a two car garage. I ripped out the doors and finished the interior. No breaks on Insulation or sheetrock doggonit.

This took five years to get where it is now. Being frugal, unfortunately, takes alot of time and patience.

And to think I started out with a 16 Biamp board, a mono 60W peavey amp, and two Radio shack mic's LOL!

 

[Aren]

Hmmpf...
And I thought I was cheap

I made a headphone splitter with individual volume controls mounted in a box of Hummus
I make my own cables and electret mics.
I built two of my desks.
A piezzo guitar pickup (which I want to burn) from a buzzer...
A small table-top mic stand (for guitar amps, manly), from a mic clip, a huge 5/8" bolt, a piece of wood and a lot of Plastic Wood (looks like shit but does the job).

But I think the Hummus headphone splitter wins. A friend of mine suggested that I start a gear company and call it Hummus Audio.

 

[RICK FITZPATRICK]

Ok ok, you guys are in the running but you still have to beat me. I just had to move all my shit I've been saving for my studio for 10 yrs. MOFO., took a 24' uhaul just to get my studio shit. I'm the KING of cheap. Buy a cable. You got to be out of your friggin mind. I still use cables I made in the 80's. I salvage chairs, steel, wood, electrical, 703, coverings or any thing that could be used. I build EVERYTHING I can. Now, unlike frederic, electronics are not my best subject. I repair what I can, but stuff like he does is not in my ability. Pretty soon, I'll post pics of the stuff I have and am planning on building. THEN, we'll see who's the king of cheap. Hey, I'm even trying to save a pole barn for my studio!!!
fitz, the cheapie king

 

[alien]

I made a headphone splitter with individual volume controls mounted in a box of Hummus
A piezzo guitar pickup (which I want to burn) from a buzzer...

That splitter rocks!!! I Love it!!!!

I made a headphone mixer that I since discontinued use of one the power supply puked. I'll post a pic. Really cool design though. Could be used for dual mono or dual stereo operation. Each channel had a volume control for each input.

I had also once made a 50' 16X4 snake using an old army ammo box, a surplus roll of TSP that was given to me, and a bunch of old connectors I had laying around. I wound up selling it on eBay. A guy bought it for his studio and loved it. I miss it

But still, that headphone splitter - it just has a touch of class to it!

Pole barn....well, when you put the control room inside a grain silo, then you get the OMG! award

 

[outlawtorn86]

damn you guys are gangster cheap. props to the guy with the headphones splitter too. ;-) im not exactly the richest kid alive. 16, have a job that pays so so, but i tend to spend the money mostly on the actual equipment. my setup consists of. sound blaster live! a 90 dollar keyboard i bought back in 1996, a purple yamaha for like kids. WOW does that thing have awesome programmed drum loops. then i got the most ghetto mic stand.

if u can comprehend, this is how i did it. took a 2 liter coke bottle filled with sand, twisted it shut. then u know those 4 liter bottles with the bigger neck? usually just plain water comes in em. i cut one of those out, and voila! its perfect for a mic to slide in! so i tape that sideways onto the top of the coke bottle, LOTS of duct tape, and sit down in front of my desk , and sing :-D thats just OG cheap

 

[outlawtorn86]

heres a pic, just for shts n giggles

 

[jake-owa]

And to think I started out with a 16 Biamp board, a mono 60W peavey amp, and two Radio shack mic's LOL!

Cool story. I love thinking about how a little studio can grow....

I think I might want to do something like that to my console but I doubt it would survive my technical, uh...expertise.

 

[jake-owa]

heres a pic, just for shts n giggles

I might have to use that sometime..though I'll just use a mic clip and zip ties.

 

[outlawtorn86]

yeh it was so sturdy with duct tape tho! then i found a mic stand at my friends house, who doesnt have a mic, and when i bought my marshall amp, the guy threw in a free stand, so heha.