Cheap tweak from Virtual Dynamics:

Anyone else try the brass screw replacement and torque experimentation? I've been experimenting with different in.-lbs. and the results have been interesting. I've only tried 3-10 in.-lbs( I'm not so sure that my old Black & decker is accurate) but so far, regarding torque, too much thins out the soundstage and too little muddies it up. With my B&D driver, on my speakers, 5 in.-lbs seems to be just right( on both tweeters and mid-woofers). But I want to do some more listening and fine-tuning. I sometimes hate being an obsessive-compulsive personality. (O:

The Audiopoint designed and manufactured in 1989 was conceived on the superior conductive musical qualities of 360m brass. Brass was also used by the Starsound members in speakers, electronics and cables. All of this was previous to Virtual Dynamics. Brent and Robert from Starsound shared many of these original applications as well as the conductive makeup of the Sistrum platform with Rick of Virtual Dynamics. Rick has moved some of these concepts well forward especially in the use of magnets and brass as a resonance control in cables and chassis design.

I will applaud Rick in his recomendation of magnets instead of fuses in my system. No fireballs at my house or that of a friend. We both found the sonic upgrade to be immediate and huge. Much more stage, impact and sheer sonic joy. Same goes with the use of AVM that stuff works wonders as well. More music less noise and no damping WOW. Rick is always at the forefront and I believe there is much more on the way. Tom

Tom,
Can you share what Rick recommended as far as using magnets instead of fuses in your system? This is intriguing.

Several years Rick came on these pages saying that the use of use of magnets in and around electronic circuitry was of great benefit. He got pushed around and laughed at as a result. He now uses magnets in many of his upper end designs. With more to come along. I used one magnet in a friends system, replaced the line fuse in his Bat 31SE preamp. The difference was huge and immediate. Now when music is played in the room his birds come down off their perch and sing and dance to tunes he has played way to many times before. Toe tapping I suppose. Sounds crazy but I've been there many times before. Maybe Rick will chime in to say why magnets work so well. Tom

My speakers are Reference 3a Dulcet. I e-mailed the main man, Tash, at Divergent Technologies and attached the VD video. He emailed me back telling me that the video was interesting and that it made sense to him. Tash asked me to run my personal tests with the brass screws and torque tests. I followed up telling him how the brass screws made a nice difference and explained to him how I came to fine-tuning the torque to achieve the best sound possible from the Dulcet. I suggested to him that he try his own tests in the factory and asked him for his results. So far, no answer from him. We'll see. I feel that this is a very good tweak and the laws of physics are in play here. I'm no physicist, but I'm thinking that the proper torque somehow is related to the screws matching the resonation of the cabinet with the speaker drivers. Perhaps someone can explain this phenomenon. It's obvious that the brass, being non-ferrous, doesn't negatively react with the driver magnets and brass has good drain-resonating characteristics. Help me here, tech guys.