To couple, or not to couple, that is the question


There seems to be a fundamental difference of opinion between those who would couple their speakers to the floor (e.g., with spikes), and those who would decouple them (e.g., with springs). I’ve gone both ways, but have found that I prefer the latter; I’ve currently got Sorbothane feet attached to my tower speakers, so that they wobble or "float"—much like the Townshend Platforms videos show for that similar, but more expensive, approach. My ears are the final arbiters of my listening experience, so they rule my choices. But my mind likes to have a theoretical explanation to account for my subjective preferences.

That’s where the question comes in. A very knowledgable audiophile friend insists that what I prefer is precisely the opposite of what is best: that ideally, the speaker enclosure should be as rigid and immovable as possible so that the moving cones of the drivers can both most efficiently and most accurately create a sound front free of the inevitable colorations that would come from fighting against a moving cabinet. He says that transients will be muddied by the motion of the cabinet set up by the motion of the speaker cones. And this makes perfect sense to me in terms of my physical intuitions. It’s perhaps analogous to the desirability of having a rigid frame in a high-performance vehicle, which allows the engineers to design the suspension without having to worry too much about the complex interactions with a flexing chassis.

Am I just deluded, then, in preferring a non-rigid interface between speaker and floor? Or does it depend on the kind of floor? (I get that most advice seems to favor decoupling from a suspended wood floor, and coupling to a slab; my floor is hardwood, but not exactly "suspended" as the underflooring structure is very rigid.) Or are there trade offs here, as there usually are in such options: do I gain something (but what, and how?) even as I lose something else (i.e., clean transients, especially in bass tones)?

The ears will win this contest, but I like to have my mind on board if possible. So thanks for any input you may have on this question.

128x128snilf

i personally believe speakers should ideally be well grounded, so that the driver movements occur against a stiff, inert backdrop

question is when you spike speakers in your room, are they spiking into a medium/environment that indeed provides excellent, solid grounding - wood floors bounce, and so on...you get my drift...

if very good grounding can’t be done, one might profitably look into letting the speakers ’float’ via softer mount points, simply give up the idea of proper grounding entirely as it is impractical in said room... that is where isopucks springs and so on could well be the lesser of the evils

the idea that a speaker should float as an ideal is to me, simply misguided

Hello Laps and Peterf6,

Regards to the video provided by johnread57:

Another home team test wins! 

This test is one-sided and similar to the other spring-loaded companies' versions. This one has more computer-generated visual enhancements and appears more professional, but the content remains the same. 

A few indicators stick out in plain sight and play a role in the outcome of the testing methodologies. 

Notice the block of marble, stone, or tile separating the actual ground plane of the floor. The stone or tile is a false ground and contains less mass than the floor. The added material reflects and vibrates at higher frequencies than the floor mass. The experiment provides a hidden agenda that affects sonic, compression wave velocity, and reflections. 

The tester refers to speakers standing “directly on the floor” too often. The speakers are standing on plinths and not on the floor. 

Here we go again with a marketing class in vibration management. 

A one-dollar spike made from aluminum, one of the worst materials used for mechanically grounding anything, proves nothing except delivering a convincing visual statement for the home team’s product. The cost-to-investment ratio for the products tested is hundreds of dollars to one dollar. 

Their dubbed isolation products cost how much more than the $1.00 spikes? 

They add a second plinth layer made from aluminum and attach it to the speaker base, enhancing the ringing qualities of the generic spikes.

 

Do you believe this as being a fair test? 

Did you learn anything from this video about sound in real context?

Here is what could happen if they played on an equal playing field. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i9XLSFxmsMA

I understand the speaker A/B comparison is coming soon. We can then hear a loudspeaker on an expensive damped spring product and a damped spike innovation costing closer to the same investment dollars.

Not all spikes function or sound the same. 

Robert 

Sound Engineer & Vibration Management Consultant

 

 

Hello Mitch2

Here are a few new things on heat conversion that you might find interesting.

We worked for a couple of years with springs and many absorbent materials. Springs were effective at first until we listened to a six-month-old application and replaced them with new springs.

Spring fatigue set in on the original set of eight. We realized that losing a minimalist amount of tension produced a higher loss of dynamics when using the application for sound reproduction.

I recommend checking the old with a new set annually. As spring fatigue sets in, ears might not pick up on the losses over time. The musical presentation also suffers. Without an A to B comparison, you might think it is time for a new amp, different wires, or speakers simply because a design fails slowly over time. 

We then realized there were weight handling and tension issues with every application. This model would not serve our needs as we searched for a universal way to manage vibrations without premature failure and would compensate for any amount of weight without the cost of constant mixing and matching parts.

Converting energy to heat is again the most popular methodology for dubbed decoupling or isolation devices. It is hard to prove what percentages of resonance convert to heat when absorption or damping is applied.

An accredited Russian Scientist has discovered a new physical paradox

“Saint-Petersburg Polytechnic University recently published documents supporting that heat generated from resonance conversion became airborne and then again was attracted back into the chassis in the form of vibration titled Ballistic Resonance hence re-establishing the problem of resonance build-up in a constant repetitive state.”

Ballistic Resonance shows that heat energy from phase cancellations and absorbent materials is born again. Once airborne, heat returns to the original device of mass that created it. Therefore heat dissipation is a returning process of vibrational energy affixed to the parent mass and eventually seeks and locates the ground plane via resonance transfer. Heat is a recurring problem at best.

Another discovery: Researchers uncover a new way heat travels between molecules

by Ali Sundermier, the University of Pennsylvania, released their findings, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, showing that heat transfer occurs when the electron moves between two molecules that are at different temperatures. Electron transfer is possibly the most important process in chemistry, according to Nitzan."Half of the chemistry is electron transfer processes," he said. "It has been investigated for 100 years on the molecular scale."

Our research displayed a sluggishness in sonic when working with less efficient or so-called isolation and decoupling products. In audiophile terms, we lost the leading edge dynamic and shortened the decay of the sound. When used with tubed or solid-state amplifiers, the component’s operational temperature climbed to create more heat. 

Heat establishes excessive inefficiencies in operation. 

The noise in electricity is the initial problem forming resonance. Rapidly grounding electronics and loudspeakers came next. Finally, the sound room was built and is unlike anything you have ever experienced took us thirty years of product development.

We are a live music-listening organization. A goal of mine is to produce the dynamics, harmonic structures, and decays associated with the live performance. Mechanical grounding allowed us to achieve the closest I have come to capturing the live event. 

We travel to hear sound rooms and playback environments. If you are such a traveler or want to listen to a sound room you can build, the Energy Room is open for auditions.

Robert