Opinions on Glass Shelves

Take a look at slate. I believe it to be the ultimate constrained layer material. Sound travels though it slowly, and is actually changed along the way. The downside is its weight, but the payoff is excellent.

Glass reflects sound, and sound travels through granite faster than through water, so I wouldn't choose either of them. They do look nice, and may not actually be detremental.

Then, there is concrete and wood. Depending on the composition, one of them may be decent. Of course, there are the foam composite shelves that are engineered for the task, too.

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I have a Sound Organization rack with glass shelves. I replaced the top shelf with a custom made Neuance shelf for my TT. The other shelves have 12"x12" sheets of asphalt damping material applied to their bottoms. Not a high end rack by any means, but it works reasonably well.

Cracked glass is a three piece laminate; there is no ringing effect which is the case with regular glass- rap your knuckle on ¾” plate then do the same with cracked glass- it is not just cosmetic- It is acoustically dead.

Billy Bags Designs

Thanks for posting, Jmstogo! Can you give us a brief description of what the laminates look like and/or the process to make these shelves? I'm not looking for secrets, just trying to get a mental image of these shelves.

Jean from Billy Bags sent me samples of the cracked glass. When you rap on it, it does not ring or sound like cracked glass just as I was told. It sounds very close to a hard synthetic material like Corian or acrylic. In fact after rapping on it, I had to study the cracked glass carefully to make sure it really was glass.

I’m not sure what that will mean in a system, but the glass itself is very gook looking.