XXHighEnd

Hi Stanley,

Sort of.  Let's say I am 9/10th of the way through the process.  The bits are all made and installed but I am yet to play with ways to tweak/improve the result.  In theory everything that I need to do is done but I still want to play with isolation vs coupling in a couple of spots.  Here is a photo of what I have built especially for my NOS1...

(http://Getting There.jpg)

First I made a simple steel rack with some damping applied to the shelves.  Then I made the pneumatic isolation platform, also from steel, which is enormously heavy (about 70kg-80kg) with many layers of damping applied.  It really is inert...if you rap your knuckles on it odds are you will bruise them.  The platform provides mostly vertical isolation.

For horizontal isolation I made some rollerblock type cups out of hardened tool steel which was then hard-chromed.  Tungsten carbide bearing balls are used in between.  If I set a ball rolling in the shallow depression of the cup it will rock away on its own for over a minute with no further stimulus...it's freaky to watch in a way.  I have since made some jigs that can be used to perfectly align the lower cup with the upper plate which also allows me to perfectly align the edge of the NOS1a with the edges of the platform...makes life a whole lot easier.

There is the dust issue with the rollerblocks but and I am considering a few ways to keep dust from getting on things and impeding the horizontal isolation.  The bearing ball is an excellent coupler of NOS1a vibrations to the heavy platform, but I think that there is more scope to play with damping rather than coupling here...perhaps.


Vibration isolation in both horizontal and vertical directions should occur at less than 3Hz.  That number is not the really important one though, I am sure that the enormous damped mass has the largest effect.  I have an accelerometer here that I will eventually use to try to take some measurements for what they are worth, just have to find time.  In the meantime the sound is profoundly improved...

Cheers,

Anthony

PS: I started a new thread for this discussion rather than muddy the other one.

Anthony, wow.

Is the photo you attached the same as the one in the middle of the text, lacking ?

Kind regards,
Peter

Yes it is Peter.  I could not figure out how to put the image in that specific location.

To be clear, that box under your NOS1 is part of the isolation means ?
If so, what are these three "knobs" ?

Peter

Yes, those three knobs are schrader valves that are plumbed into the pneumatic isolators...air springs is another term for them.  That box is anything but hollow and weighs about 80kg (on purpose).

Anthony,


Weren't you in an attic somewhere with all your gear ?
Is there a prediction when all collapses ?
:)

Best regards,
Peter

Yes, everything is upstairs.  I have built four of those platforms and combined with the gear and the rack I built that is about 400kg.  The same isolation principles are built into the tube amps in my active horns.

Yesterday I put an AB SS amp onto one of the platforms and I am sure everything sounds better...soundstage has leapt out in size.

Wow!

How are the new speakers coming on?

Mani.

They are so close I can hear them singing to me.  Flat out with work at the moment so I'm not getting much time to finish the last horns and power-test the amplifiers.  It will happen though...

Hi Anthony,

Thank you for your report. Very impressive piece of work.

Not a tweak for the average NOS-1 owner  :scratching: but I can imagine the impact it must have on SQ.

Another topic for a future thread maybe, but I'm wondering what influence LED lighting (drivers and converters) and solar panels will have on our SQ.

Cheers,
Stanley