Grateful Dead Music Forum

Happy New Year!

Anyone know of a source for psychaedelic grill cloth, similar to what Hard Truckers uses for their Psychaedelic Liberator cabs, I could use for a new build? I did some Googling figuring it would be easy to find but struck out!

Many thanks.

P.S. What type of fabric (material, e.g., cotton, linen, silk, etc.) are guitar cab grill cloths typically made from anyways?!

Hey Jon-

I had thought about doing this myself some time ago. There was a thread about this topic. I did the same thing- searched the web, etc. Hardtruckers is very costly. You can do it at home for a fraction of the cost. There are tons of how-to websites for various tye-dying techniques and also high quality dyes for sale, as well. I bought some cotton muslin fabric from my local JoAnne Fabric store and did some test patterns. I used cr@ppy dyes so they weren't that bright but they gave me an idea what it would look like. I just temp stapled them to the existing frame on my combo amp. Although I don't think they looked too bad, I never followed through on purchasing good dyes to do the real thing. But, I learned that it can be done for about $25.

Here was that thread:

http://www.rukind.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=309&t=5717

Yeah, psychedelic speaker grill cloths are cool for hippie dope bands, some of ours are made from old T-shirts, others are from tie-dyed (porous) cloth.

I like your band's grill cloths a lot. It's those kind of patterns, surprisingly, I'm having trouble locating.

You could always get a tapestry and cut it to size.

That is precisely what I've been trying to do but I can't even find tapestries that are close to the types of designs on the HT's Psychedelic Liberator web page. FWIW, here are some examples of designs I've found so far that might perhaps work for me but they're not really exactly what I have in mind.

http://www.pandorasboxoc.com/mocetawaha.html

http://www.trippystore.com/grateful_dea ... estry.html

http://sunshinedaydream.biz/store/item/ ... estry.html

Jon S.
Try the dreaded ebay, search "tye dye" under "crafts" and/or "clothing", yes there are other categories besides "musical instruments".
Lembic

I found my cloth! Made to order by a talented, friendly Pennsylvania tie-dye artist. My new SSP Jerry 2X12 cab is now set for completion and I'll post a pic of it when it arrives.

Looks awesome Jon,

Just found this thread last night - as I was looking to see how people have attached silk to a wooden frame (I am thinking 3M Super 77 aerosol glue or an epoxy).

In the interest of helping out any other heads looking for fabric - I ordered at http://fabricdesigns.com/silks.htm I was after the Hardtrucker style and got enough Habotai Silk for 3 2x12 cabs for $49 (shipping to Canada included). I ordered one of her stock designs (green+blue - 1/2 yard) and then had a yard of a custom design done (I sent her a pic of an existing cloth I liked and she did a killer job replicating it).

Looking forward to seeing your finished job Jon - I will post mine up as well.

Excellent. Oh, and BTW, my cloth is muslin.

Notice any difference in sound? I tried some from the fabric store (cotton poly blend if I had to guess, very light) and felt like it was muffling my highs. This is on a cab that is fabric-free from the factory, has a metal grill.

I'll report back when I have the covers done. I don't think it will be an issue as the silk is exceptionally thin.

Hard Truckers does custom grills...

Poke around on their site.

I got one a few years ago...

On its way!

That looks awesome Jon - congrats! May I ask what adhesive you used to attach the silk to the wooden frame?