Foamy "spikes"

[hotsyflotsy]

In the neverending quest for optimum sound with my existing set, I was struggling with the floor. Right, with the floor. As I live in an old house with a wooden floor, I wanted to keep the resonances down, but give the speakers a stable ground.

I tried different solutions, until I thought of putting that acoustically damping foam they use in walls (the type which consists out of all different colours of foam). I cut out two pieces which are slightly smaller than the footprint, put it underneath my two front speakers. See picture.

My rationale were: putting a speaker on spikes is IMO meant to de-couply the speaker from any surface. Acoustically damping foam is meant to do just that, and not only for contact-noise, but also for air-carried noise. Cuts both ways, don't it?

And it sounded great., so for me, it worked: Q.E.D.

So, just suppose I didn't fool myself with the psycho-acoustic wishful thinking: what are your thoughts on this?

[Magura]

I once did something similar by inflating an inner tube for my sub to sit on. Worked well but tokk some re-inflation from time to time.

Im sure you also will experience your foam mat getting flat with time.

Magura

[Sch3mat1c]

Will work a hell of a lot better than umm let's see RIGID METAL CONES or whatever is typically used.

Tim

[SY]

putting a speaker on spikes is IMO meant to de-couply the speaker from any surface.

Actually, it does just the opposite. What you've done is gone from tight coupling to decoupling.

what are your thoughts on this?

If you like it, don't worry about anyone else's thoughts!

Nice town, Nijmegen.

[Pbassred]

There was a thread in the speakers section a while back on a slightly different topic. They percieved a fall off of bass response. It seems that positioning on a less them solid floor alows the speaker to vibrate an loose its energy. They descussed positioning their cabs on heavy paving slabs to isolated them from the floor.
Since everything we know about sound isolation involves dense material, I can see the logic here. Perhaps a paving slab on top of foam would do the trick.

[fdegrove]

Hi,

Perhaps a paving slab on top of foam would do the trick.

Or on top of the speaker cabinet as well.

Those old suspended wooden floors are a real pain when it comes to floorstanding speakers.

Cheers,