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In Reply to: RE: Thoughts—long posted by David Aiken on September 20, 2007 at 04:15:00
Hi Dave, thank you for your in-depth response. My expectations about the graphite Tune Blocks arose from reading Rick Beckers reviews, who had a bent for experimenting with many footers over the years. As you say, they may have simply worked particularly well with his stand. An interesting twist on this is that he was particularly smitten with the use of Sonophonon squares ( 3" square constrained layer damped stainless steel plates) used between the component and the footer itself (Sonophonon squares from Sound Dead Steel, a U.K. company who supply Linn amongst others, with dampening materials ). He subsequently used Boston Audio Tune Plates, modelled on the Sonophonons, to the same effect. He opined that the squares produced a greater magnitude of improvement than the footer itself ( or any footer he tried for that matter ), and that they improved considerably upon any footer. The SE Tune Blocks in concert with the squares he considers 'state of the art ' isolation control - depending on your frame of reference I suppose. The squares apparently work very well under speaker spikes and I assume stand spikes too.
I am going to chase up some squares from the U.K. which can be obtained manufacturer direct ( around $32 US for a set of four, verses $40 each for Tune Plates, though postage may narrow the gap ) and try them with my Cereballs and Darumas and under my stand. It turns out the Boston Tune Blocks are available in Brisbane, so in time I will try this combo and report back.
I note your other post and that you are a Queensland Audio Club member - will be in touch. Very surprised that additional footers on the Monaco shelves didn't improve on the component feet (?) Doesn't make sense unless the increased coupling to the shelf ( I presume ) came with a strong footer signature, which doesn't say a lot for footers.
Follow Ups:
"Very surprised that additional footers on the Monaco shelves didn't improve on the component feet (?) Doesn't make sense unless the increased coupling to the shelf ( I presume ) came with a strong footer signature, which doesn't say a lot for footers."
I think the reason is simply that the whole structure is designed to work together as a system with nothing between the shelf and component. I think a lot of time and engineering knowledge went into the design and they simply did a good job of optimising things so that the system works well as a whole the way it was intended to work and trying to second guess things at the user end just doesn't help.
I actually find it quite refreshing to know I simply no longer have to worry about fine tuning with things like feet. I simply take one component off, put another on, and change the sorbothane dampers between shelf and frame if there's a significant mass change and/or once every 12-18 mths as basic maintenance. So much simpler than my old DIY constructions and it looks one hell of a lot better.
David Aiken
In acknowledging that footers don't appear to improve upon the Monaco's benchmark (neutral) performance, one wonders how the designers of the Monaco stand factored in the variety of component feet available and their efficiency or otherwise in draining component vibration. This would appear to be an impossible task given the variables involved in the plethora of components available, both in physical make-up and different levels of vibration control utilised in component design. Perhaps the designers did not feel that component generated vibration, or accoustic (pressure) waves hitting the component, presented as important an issue as vibration generated by the floor/stand/shelf unit itself i.e. low frequency vibration causes the most damage to sonic integrity. It is interesting that outstanding results have been observed with pneumatic air isolation ( without using footers ) and magnetic isolation ( SAP Relaxa3+ or Clearaudio Magix ). If indeed most of the damage is done by floor/stand/shelf, this would explain how the DIY shelfless approach is a step in the right direction, in the absence of meticulous shelf design.
To throw another (confusing ) slant on this, Stereophiles Brian Damkroger reviewed Finite Elements Pagode Master Reference ( at over $6000 )and found that component footers ( Cereballs and Cerapucs ) were needed throughout to give the best sonic results, with $100,000 worth of components ! ( he deemed the addition of the footers gave a 'jaw dropping' degree of improvement compared to the stand itself ). In light of this, the Monaco stand ( at least in view of Dave's experience above )is either (1)of considerably superior vibration blocking /absorbing design, leaving the component largely untouched, where the speed or efficiency of resonance drain from the component doesn't seem to matter as much (2)the Pagode Master Reference has been designed to use with its own footers which are mainly coupling devices, inferring the quick and efficient drainage of component energy is as important as its sophisticated shelf design ( with inbuilt 'tuning-fork' like resonators which dissipate energy ). The upshot of this (a tentative conclusion)is that from a DIY perspective the focus should be on preventing the vibration travelling through floor/stand/shelf from reaching the component. This would pre-empt the need for a more difficult or sophisticated design which would by necessity take into account the sonic signature of footers (as contributors to this thread have pointed out, there appears to be no footer that completely isolates i.e. is completely neutral). It would appear that vertical and horizontal isolation/damping of stand and shelf if used, is the main priority. In an imperfect world, component footers may be used to fine tune the result.
The sad balls ( Norsorex ) appear interesting as vertical isolators. Anyone besides bartc have experience with these ? Thanks Al for the info on damping power cords.
Re the Monaco and footers: any footer is going to raise the height of the component somewhat—it has to if it's going to fit under the component and get the component up off its own feet— and that is going to raise the centre of gravity of the component. Perhaps keeping the centre of gravity as low as possible is important for the Monaco type of design, and stock feet is as low as most of us go.
Re shelfless racks: that was the way I went when I designed the rack I used prior to purchasing the Monaco. Eliminating shelves definitely reduces one area where things can go wrong with a DIY rack, but it also makes what goes between the frame members and the component more important. I started obsessing on that and tweaking it regularly, at considerable cost.
The Pagode Reference design: From what I've read, this design works in part by the user tuning resonanators as you mention. It seems to have a very different design approach to the Grand Prix Audio racks. You don't adjust resonanators with the GPA designs but you do have to match the sorbothane dampers used between shelf and frame to the mass of the component placed on the shelf.
There's always more than one way to skin a cat and there are obviously a number of viable strategies for vibration control so you do have a range of choices if you want to get such a rack.
David Aiken
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