Vibraplane: Should it be loaded close to limit?

Dan,

Indeed the Vibraplane uses a type of air spring which I think contributes significantly to its excellent horizontal isolation; they are not mere bladders, or else I'd just do the inner tube trick and be done. The compressor has a regulator and moisture trap, and the Vibraplane has its own regulator valve as well. Alas, I traced the leak back to the unit itself, and not the air line(s) on or from the compressor. While I am uncertain if it's actually an air spring leaking or one of the leveling regulators (for lack of a better term) it still means having to flip it over to find out - soapy water at the ready. There's also a lot of air tubing running all over the place under there, so it could be that as well.

Needless to say, I'm going to have to return to the sandbox for a while until I can pin down the problem. Of course cajoling friends into helping one heft these things around usually takes a free dinner and plenty of beer...ah the lengths we go to for this hobby.

I'll keep my fingers crossed the leak is at a connector. I can imagine there are quit a few of those.

FYI to anyone following along. There is a used 2212 on ebay, no compressor. It is too far from me for shipping so I didn't buy it.

Palasr, do get in touch with Solong - he too has some history with leaking Vibraplane tubing/ feet. I'm sure he can give some hints which might spare you part of search/repeated tries.
Good luck,
D.

The one on ebay looks ancient! I think $100 is optimistic for a shipping price, as you'd need to use a freight carrier.

Thanks Dertonarm, good to know. Cheers!

-Richard

The passive unit I just bought cost about $250 to air freight from the West Coast to the East Coast. Rather expensive. Kinetic Systems is in Boston and Sounds of Silence is in NH so that is certainly a more economical option if one can find one used.

I do find the filling and releasing of air manually takes a bit of getting used to. The process took about 10 minutes for me to set up initially, and it is holding level 24 hours later. The three feet are each about 1/8" over the edge of my top shelf on my Zoethecus rack, so I am looking for a large slab of granite to put under the unit to distribute the load directly over the vertical legs of the rack. The added weight at the top of the rack is not good as you can imagine the pendulum effect.

I also started looking into pre-loading options and am getting prices for 24" X 20" slabs of granite, marble and steel of various thicknesses. I hope to have a slab in the 100-125 lb range to play with pre-loading.

Vibraplane does make a newer type device which only weighs 45 lbs, has a smaller footprint and seems to be more user friendly. I've never seen one used, but there is an excellent review in Positive Feedback.

Dan, my passive unit can be filled up with a compressed air tank/canister. This may be easier than the hand pump, but it still will not have the automatic self leveling feature, which could be very convenient.