Sand or shot for speaker stands?

Sackrete Contractor Grade Fine at Home Depot is uniform and dry (they keep it inside unlike the kiddie sand) and slides right thru a flunnel ~ $4 for 50lbs. My two-column targets took 20 lbs. each and no regrets. Don't forget to stick your 805's to the top plates lest you knock them off. Has anyone tried 90 weight gear oil :-)

I reckon the spikes are best to support the speaker, particularly if you have loaded your stands, and this will probably get rid of the "closed in" sound. Another issue I didn't mention was the nature of the speaker cabinet. With very dead cabinets, or ones with a low resonance point - such as the birch ply used for some UK speakers, I have found that aluminium stands can be best ie. very light and rigid. With most speakers now using MDF however, steel stands with some damping is usually best. Albertporter knows this well - don't get sucked into thinking that any tweak gets rid of resonances, they just shift them around. Whether it is lead or sand, you are just shifting the resonance point. What you try to do is smooth the resonances so that they dispell their energy quickly and over a wide band. Steel stands get rid of their energy quickly but over a narrow band. Filling them you spread the band, but the speed is compromised. Filling them with poured lead would probably be a disaster. You can get back some of the speed by using the spikes to support the speakers. Sorry for the rambling nature of the post.

Redkiwi, I want to be clear that I am asking about spikes into the floor instead of rubber feet. The 805's have an option of suspending the speaker itself on a type of small spike or mounting it to the stand with 2 screws through the plate that the speaker sits on directly into the underside of the speaker itself, locking it into place. The stand is a bit wobbly, even with the sand, so I guess I will try the floor spikes. I think that B & W's stands are aluminum, with a steel base. It seems that the speaker have good transparency, but are not imaging that well yet. I don't know if it is speaker placement or the sand fill. I will try the spikes on Sun. afternoon and see if that helps. I am still breaking them in and these sound aspects may change. That was very interesting info regarding resonances, and it makes sense to me.

Albert, When you mix the shot and the sand, do you put the shot in first and then the sand, or do you alternate with a little of each?

Bmp, I alternate. I pour shot, then sift just enough sand to fill voids that the pellets will not go into. Not every situation will lend itself to this way of addressing the problem, so I will give a lengthy description of a problem solver on a larger project. I have the Soundlab Ultimate Ones, and the construction is such, that the speaker frames are one quarter inch steel pipe (very pretty pipe!) and welded shut at the bottom to a flange that contains the power supply. In this situation, I did not want a "upside down pendulum," that is, a frame where the weight was heavier above the center line than below the center. I had canvas bags made, with Velcro closures, and fitted with brass grommets. At the bottom of the Soundlab frames (pipes) were bags with 100% lead. Then just above those were bags with 75% lead and 25% silica. Then 50% and 50% of each. At the very top of the speaker was 100% silica. I achieved a mix of lead and silica, not unlike you are asking about for a smaller stand. However, the Soundlab is 7 feet tall, and this was a way to control resonances with a predictable mix, where otherwise, it would have been out of control! The grommets I described, were tied through by a long nylon cord. This allowed me to drop each bag and remove it (if necessary) to achieve the mix I wanted. I know this is a long answer, but the idea is that each project may need to be addressed in a creative way to get the proper results. Larger projects could possibly benefit from the idea I came up with for my speaker frames. In my case, pouring directly into this 7 foot long frame made this project completely out of control. Some of you may encounter similar situations, and hope this helps.