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Mapleshade boards under speakers

Hi,
Anyone try these, either the finished or unfinished, 2 or 4", with isoblocks or brass feet?
My floors are soft yellow pine, and I've made overall improvements using a panel of birchply under them, wondering what the maple would do? He certainly makes great claims for them.

Thanks
Chas
chashas1
sebraasch
17 posts
 
It will take me a bit to make the stands but I will let you know the results. I do not know if it was this thread or another, but I also found some recycled rubber pucs (from car tires). I got the idea to look at HVAC sound and vibration isolators and thought these might work under the board. But if I am understanding your opinion it is to have the speaker on the board without spikes or should the speaker be spiked as well.
knownothing
1,653 posts
 
The Mapleshade folks suggest you should use cones between speakers and platforms, and platforms and the floor = twice isolated. I would just experiment to see what works best. Instead of buying four sets of cones right away if you don't already have them, buy two and and test them while driving only one side of your system. Test them on top of the platform, on the bottom, and on both top and bottom, and see which way sounds best to you.

I don't use any cones with my platforms, just connect the speakers to bamboo platforms with Blutack and have the platforms sitting directly on the hardwood floor. Not saying this is best, just works well enough for me for now - much better than having speakers sitting directly on the floor without wooden platforms.
mechans
3,048 posts
 
Make sure it is the best kiln dried maple hand ruubed with just mineral or tung iol . I use 4" thick ones with oil finish and there is a very obvious changein my syste,. I now have very attractive slabs of very thick maple and brass cones. It look great. The system sound pretty much the way it always did it just loooks better.
Under my preamp a thick dampening pad had a obvious sonic impact. That is likely a function of keepining the tubes as still as I can. My Make shift pad is going to be replaced with a 5 inch tall sandbox of pure tiger maple if Timbernation sends it. I am gointo use finely powcered lead for damping and ballat atop giggantic brass feet I am making to order. They wiegh 20lbs a piece and will sit in a speceial high tension suspended cup. Total figure 100 KG- or 220lbs plus the pre.
johnmcalpin
58 posts
 
Has anybody ever used a Sistrum speaker stand atop a Mapleshade platform?

I've used Sistrum and loved the results under speakers, amp and for a rack. But I like the idea of raising the speakers a few inches for soundstage height.
mmakshak
589 posts
 
Johnmcalpin, I use a sistrum stand on top of 4-inch Mapleshade amp stands. My room is carpet over concrete. Unfortunately, I also use a cheap 1 1/2 foot wood speaker stand on top of the sistrum, so I can only hint at what you might want as an answer. Also, this situation is fragile(speakers have been knocked over.). The sistrum tightened the bass and was slightly less warm than when the speakers's stands just sat on the Mapleshade. I didn't like it at first, but decided that the extra bass and precision might be worth it. I will have to change this for security purposes, and I might be interested in Mapleshade's Gibraltor speaker stands.
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