Granite under your amp???

I use granite under my speakers primarily to protect the hardwood floor. Results have be outstanding.

For what it's worth, I think granite would serve as a better base than marble - if you look closely at a slab of marble, in most cases it's held together with some kind of fabric. Marble is full of fissures and the cloth stuff keeps it from falling apart!!

If you are looking for something that is structurally sound, go with granite over marble - however the really pretty granite with buzillions of colors can be almost as fragile as marble. The "absolute black" granite seemed to be the strongest.

I just built a custom audio rack that uses granite shelves. They are 3/4-inch thick pieces that were custom cut by a local stone company using their computer numerical controlled water jet machine. The shelves cost $100 each (five total) and are 19-inches wide by 26-inches long with a curved front.

Perhaps if you look in your Yellow Pages under "stone" you can find a like business in your area. The people I work with also have "drops" which are scrap to them that they sell really cheap. I buy the drops and make tables with them - average cost for a 30 x 30 inch piece is about $15. I use a dry diamond blade in a standard circular saw to cut them.

With any stone, you need to look carefully to see whether there are cracks in it. I got one piece of scrap that had to be fixed because of a crack so that it would not break. This is not difficult to do. You can use a marine epoxy - not automotive (like Bondo brand). Auto epoxy is polyester based and too thick.

You turn the rock over to expose the back side and apply the epoxy along the the crack with a brush feeding it into the crack. The epoxy will work its way through the crack and come out on the front side (place the rock on a piece of wax paper or you will glue it to the surface it is sitting on).

Wait overnight, turn the rock over and scrape the epoxy off the front side. This is easy to do if rock is polished. The piece I fixed has been used as a table top and used outdoors on a patio for the past 4 years. The epoxy I used was MAS brand, it's like West Systems or System 3. You can also get small cans of "marine" epoxy at Home Depot.

I bought a marble cutting board (or bread board)at a cooking retail store for $20.00. I put it under the cd player I was using, and it sounded much better.

here's what i did for my paradigm studio 60's. went to home depot and bought two 18x18x2 concrete squares and they had some rubber mats(4 to a package) that fit together for kids to play on and two 18x18 ceramic tile sheets. i cut four 18x18 squares from the mats used contact cement and glued one on each surface of the concrete blocks then i glued the ceramic tile on each rubber surface paint the sides of the concrete square and you have a great stand.
cost?? concrete $4 each, rubber squares $15 package of four, ceramic tile $4 each, contact cement $4 can, spray paint $4 can total = $40 talk about heavy and they look great, bass is tighter and there is a lot more air around the instruments.

according to Mapleshade records they have tested all possible platforms over the years and found maple (go figure) buthcher blocks to be the best, even over 100+lb slabs of marble and lead, I haven't done the experimenting to confirm this