Townshend Springs under Speakers

stringreen,
Just to be clear, are you using Vandersteen's recommended bases at this time? If not, and he's recommending three point support, I would say look into the Starsound support platforms. They were a miracle for my floorstanders and others too. If I understand correctly, it is more of a sophisticated energy drain from the vibrations of the speaker cabinets, and it's not a subtle difference. It makes the speakers disappear.

"I thought the best results were whatever sounds best to you in your listening room"

@chayro, I agree that actually listening is the final arbiter.  Well  Richard Vandersteen did exactly  that with his speakers in two seperate rooms. He found that springs resulted in "dynamic compression " and "smearing". 

It does raise the spector of speaker enclosure construction,  rigidity, internal bracing and resistance to resonance and vibration. Given the differences between his Vandersteen cabinet implementation and say Tekton or another speaker, could this be responsible for his outcome variance compared to what others report?

It seems logical that speaker cabinet design and construction is a significant consideration to explain the relative effectiveness of springs versus  the alternatives. 
Charles 

@stringreen

...my thinking is that if the speaker can rock, the timing will suffer - don’t know that as fact..just wondering), also my speakers are extremely heavy and would require hired hands to complete the setup.. too much for an experiment.

Yes, you would probably need the help of one other person.

However, there are inexpensive tools that can help the set-up process: inflatable bladders sold on Amazon, 7" square furniture sliders, and round MoveAlls. The 7" square sliders are great for helping to slide and position speakers onto the podiums. The round sliders are great for placing under the Podium feet to easily position the speakers. When you’ve locked in the position, use an air bladder or two to raise the podium just enough to pull out the furniture sliders.

Again, Richard Vandersteen has addressed what he heard using Townshend podiums under his loudspeakers in this comment previously posted here, and originally posted in your Vandersteen forums thread.

In my rooms it caused dynamic compression and smearing because the speaker enclosure moves. It does make the sound less bright and the sound stage gets more diffuse (larger but less defined) which may sound better with some speakers especially if like most speakers the tweeter is too bright.

Will podiums have the same affect on your 5A loudspeakers in your system and room? You’ll have to try them yourself.

I’d definitely go with podiums versus bars or individual pods. Townshend advises this for better stability.

BTW...I used Starsound platforms under Silverline Sonata III loudspeakers: expansive three dimensional image floating free of the speakers, tighter and more controlled bass. You’d definitely need a few helpers to install those.

Another option are A/V RoomService EVP constrained layer footers.

@roxy54,
Star Sound platforms versus the Townshend would be a very worthwhile comparison of two highly praised products. Based on the Richard Vandersteen experience I would not be surprised if the chosen speaker/ room favors one over the other.
Charles

If the speakers are extremely heavy that is mass, which is in the kilograms, while the moving parts are cones and voice coils, are in the grams. What this means, if you know your physics, f=ma force equals mass times acceleration, you can have a hell of a lot of driver cone acceleration while moving the speaker mass only microscopically.   

Still, this microscopic movement matters. Because the finest details we hear are so low in level they correspond to cone movement measured in angstroms. Really, really small. 

Which might argue for rigid mounting. Except it turns out the bigger problem is once the mass does move it transmits this vibration down through the cabinet into the floor and from then on the whole speaker/room system is vibrating.

This ringing goes on a lot longer than if the same vibrations were confined to the speaker cabinet alone. It is the duration of the ringing and not the amplitude that blurs and smears and loses detail and dynamics. This is visually demonstrated by putting a seismograph (in the form of an iPad) on a speaker. The speaker on spikes shows obvious prolonged ringing. The same speaker on Podiums shows virtually no ringing. The sound we hear corresponds perfectly to this demonstration.

There is indeed some loss of dynamics. But there is also the same loss even when supposedly rigidly mounted on spikes or cones or whatever, even on concrete. This happens because of another physics feature, leverage. Drivers are always some distance from the floor. This distance is a lever arm. Anyone can prove this, simply push on the top of your speaker, believe me it will move. Push hard enough it will fall over, spikes or not. But even a small push of a fraction of a pound will with tall speakers leverage into lots of pounds at the base.

The speaker rocks. Either way. Virtually the same amount. Main difference, springs make it easier to see. Real difference, springs allow the vibrations to dissipate much faster. That is why they sound so much cleaner, in spite of superficial appearances.