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Post by petea on Sept 18, 2022 8:34:52 GMT
And that, as has been mentioned before I think, is where Max started. He got the idea when looking at how to stop vibration affecting the valve-based equipment in reconnaissance aircraft and then produced his first prototype for a record deck by sandwiching an inner tube between two plates. Problems with maintaining the correct pressure and getting the balance and levelling right took him to the air-damped springs that are now employed. You still see a few of those early air-only Seismic Sink platforms pop up on eBay from time-to-time. Getting the spring strength right is important and coping with uneven weight distribution in components can still be a challenge. I sometimes use individual Pods instead of a platform and position them under areas where heavier components are. In some cases I mix Pods with different loads and even mix them on platforms. For example, the platform under the Lector power amplifier in the UK has heavier springs in the front than in the back to accommodate the position of the large toroidal transformers. I have yet to hear a negative impact (and there is not a hint of quantum science involved - I mean why would you want to risk your footers etc becoming entangled with someone else's system!  ). |
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Post by karatestu on Sept 18, 2022 8:42:44 GMT
And that, as has been mentioned before I think, is where Max started. He got the idea when looking at how to stop vibration affecting the valve-based equipment in reconnaissance aircraft and then produced his first prototype for a record deck by sandwiching an inner tube between two plates. Problems with maintaining the correct pressure and getting the balance and levelling right took him to the air-damped springs that are now employed. You still see a few of those early air-only Seismic Sink platforms pop up on eBay from time-to-time. Getting the spring strength right is important and coping with uneven weight distribution in components can still be a challenge. I sometimes use individual Pods instead of a platform and position them under areas where heavier components are. In some cases I mix Pods with different loads and even mix them on platforms. For example, the platform under the Lector power amplifier in the UK has heavier springs in the front than in the back to accommodate the position of the large toroidal transformers. I have yet to hear a negative impact (and there is not a hint of quantum science involved - I mean why would you want to risk your footers etc becoming entangled with someone else's system! ). Yes, getting things balanced with tubes could be a problem. My speakers weren't a problem though as the weight is centred due to their design. I have had to add more air once in nearly a year. I can cope with that. For things like turntables and cdp's I thought I could add weight internally to even out the weight distribution. All my kit has remote power supplies so heavy transformers won't be a problem for me. |
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Post by petea on Sept 18, 2022 8:48:27 GMT
Maybe trying to add more mass to the plate above the tube so that the uneven distribution in the component becomes less significant would help. I did this to some extent with the Allegri+ and the master-clock in the UK system by placing a 2 mm thick bamboo ply plate over the Seismic platform. The unequal weight of the components then had less impact on the overall levelling.
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Post by petea on Sept 18, 2022 8:52:07 GMT
Actually, that probably won't work with tubes, but it will with non-linear springs.
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Post by MartinT on Sept 18, 2022 8:56:59 GMT
I find that levelling my Ushers carefully on the Podiums gets them nicely free and gently bobbing from side to side. It only takes millimetres of adjustment, but they're very heavy (160kg) so moving them by tiny amounts involves getting a door wedge (using a rubber mallet) between speaker and Podium and shifting it slightly. It takes all my strength to do this, not easy on my own.
Get it right and bass is very tight, tuneful, has texture and does not load up the room except with some extreme music.
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Post by petea on Sept 18, 2022 9:14:27 GMT
Luckily mine are much lighter, but the Elas especially are tricky to balance as they only just fit (next size up would be way too big) and getting the 3 contact points right is a challenge, especially as their weight is greater at the rear than the front. The arcs are dead easy except for getting clearance for the ends of the cables as the connections are on the bottom - I have ordered some spacing material to give a bit more clearance for the termination blocks on the Townshend Fractal cables I use here. Hmm, think about it, I could have cut some discs from one of the bamboo cutting boards I have lying around as I did for other things in the UK. I forget about them.
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Post by HD Music & Test on Sept 18, 2022 11:11:46 GMT
Also think about decoupling the speaker from the podiums themselves, it will bring a smile to your face.
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Post by MartinT on Sept 18, 2022 11:25:59 GMT
I have thick felt pads in between but doing better will be a job for when I have a couple of strong friends around.
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Post by petea on Sept 18, 2022 13:09:46 GMT
Also think about decoupling the speaker from the podiums themselves, it will bring a smile to your face. I was planning to try that with the Arcs as I need to increase the clearance under them on the Podiums and have never been overly impressed with plastic feet on the speakers themselves. I have a variety of materials ordered that I will create sandwiches with. Cork, felt and acrylic layers have proved interesting in the past. The Seismic Platforms have a decoupling layer between the Pod supports and the top plate and the speaker bars have a felt layer (probably to stop the speakers sliding though), but the Podiums only have a thick and slightly elastic coating on them. BR is a possibility too. |
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Post by HD Music & Test on Sept 18, 2022 13:28:28 GMT
On my own Podiums, I stripped the paint off and had them plastic coated to a high standard.
In the past I have had the 'paint' come off and customers were not to happy.
From our experinace using another form of isolation bewteen the speakers and platorms is very benefical, also if you are using stand mounts, then a isolation layer between the speaker / stand also works well.
In my personal listening spaces the podiums delivered deeper and and more rounded bass, lowered the noise floor and gave a more fixed image. For a great many users it's a big plus. Not so good for myself, the sound lost depth and textural renderings plus it rolled off more (not neccessarily a bad trait in a great many systems) though in mine it was a down step. The Track Audio isolators give my Tad's greater articulation, improved timbre and bass thats deeper & tighter plus it follows the tune so well. However as I have mentioned it is system dependant and I have achieved many great upgrades with the podiums in a many systems. As with all of these upgrades and tweaks they are so many possibilities and variables with every system. They is as with many boxes, no one true way and what suits one chap, may well not work for another. Great product no question at all.
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