Machine Shop Sound System

Sony Str De445 Home Stereo Receiver in machine shop

A good machine shop is not complete without music. A while back I found out that the machine shop had the same speakers built into the ceiling as the Great Room. Unfortunately, they were just put in and never installed. I really wanted to put some life into the shop so I decided to set them up myself.

The first step was to figure out where the speakers actually were.

The panel to the left of the opening is what the speakers look like.

Since the speaker panels look slightly different than the regular ceiling panel, I located the 2 speakers and peeked up into the ceiling to wire them up.

The space is so tight above the speaker that I couldn’t get a good picture of the wires coming out, but this is what above the panels looks like.

Eventually, I found where the wires were and routed them down into the shop. Fortunately a spot perfect for the Stereo Receiver was right there.

We didn’t have the specifically needed audio cables so I had to make a custom one to plug my device into the speakers, I also had to run an extension cord from the outlet behind the stockpile to the spot that I cleared out. Stereo RCA to 3.5 mm TRRS.

Fortunately everything definitely worked first try, and the machine shop feels just a little more lived in. Now for some beauty pics courtesy of Joshua Thompson. All that is left now is to make it pretty, but that is for another time.

Aidan Chin CompE Class of 2026 adchin@umass.edu