Speaker isolation - spikes on puck, springs, sorbothane


I’ve recently become aware of the idea of using platforms like townshend, or Gaia, or a suitable Sorbothane product. My Wilson Sophia are 160lbs each and currently sit on a suspended second floor in my living room of my wood frame house. I’ve also discovered a plethora of isolating cable springs used in aviation and industrial applications. My speakers are on the wilson conical diodes and brass discs. 
there are number of ways to do this, the cable style seem they’d be the best at absorbing the widest frequencies vs a straight spring. 
 

any thoughts observations, cautions?

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Showing 2 responses by tonywinga

I started out some years back replacing the spikes on my Thiel speakers with springs.  I bought big butcher blocks for platforms and bored holes to hold the springs.  I used four 48 lb/in springs per side to get a Fn of 3 Hz.  The travel was limited by having the springs in the pockets of the platforms.  The resulting change in sound on my suspended floor was dramatic.  Using an accelerometer I could see effective isolation down to 3 Hz.  And don’t worry, the speakers drivers do not have enough mass to make the speakers move in reaction to their motion.

After about 9 months I decided to buy and try the IsoAcoustics GAIA feet.  Pretty expensive but I found my speakers sounded better with the GAIA.  Surprisingly, the GAIA feet do not isolate the speakers from the floor as well as the straight springs.  I kept the GAIA but put my spring platforms under my subs.  The subwoofers sound amazing being perfectly isolated from the floor.

When I got my Wilson Sasha DAWs I used the Wilson spikes.   The DAWs energize the floor, the walls and the furniture.  WOW are they powerful.  I bought the big GAIA footers and tried them on the DAWs.  They firmed up the bass and improved imaging.  Very expensive footers to support the weight of the DAWs but I kept them- didn’t want to go back to the spikes.  Wilson says their new isolation feet work better than the GAIAs but they are double the cost.  

Another thing to keep in mind:  Springs isolate, rubbers dampen.  And the damping properties vary with weight, frequency input and durometer of the rubber as well as formulation and temperature.  Rubber materials will affect the sound of a stereo component,  no question; but how it impacts the sound and interacts with a component can get very complicated.

The GAIA footers look like they use a combination of spring isolation and rubber dampening.  I think that is why they sounded better with my speakers vs. straight springs.

The other option is Townsend speaker platforms.  They utilize spring isolation.  I do not know too much about them.  I have never seen a set first hand but that was my inspiration for making my own speaker spring platforms.