Filling speaker stands: sand, lead, steel, rice. Full, half, etc?


With my proac tablettes, I am using 28 inch speaker stands which have two round steel tubes about two inches in diameter.  The stands have spikes into my wooden floor (through carpet) and rubber pads on top.  I have a rather small room 12x12, and I have played around with the speaker positions in the room, finding a pretty sweet spot optimizing the bass and soundstage.  I have done all this with the stands unfilled.

so I am looking for advice on filling the stands. What do I use: sand, steel shot, lead shot, rice?  Do I fill them half full, three quarters, or full? Do I fill all the tubes the same? Can overfill makes things worse?

like most things (i.e. speaker placement) I suspect there will be some trial and error, but as it will be a real pain in the rear to fill/empty/refill the various materials to really compare, I am hoping that there are some lessons learned that the rest of you can share with me to get me pretty close with my first trial.

Alos, what effect will the filling have- should I expect deeper bass, bigger soundstage, greater depth, more detail, or..... better yet what should I not expect to change? This will help me know what I should be listening for as I tweak things.

and finally, should I expect my current optimum speaker position to change with filled stands? Will I have to go through the whole positioning exercise again?

thanks, ( and happy new year)

Bill
meiatflask
Very small diameter steel shot works well.

Micro-Bearings is the best that I have found for fill however it can get expensive; http://starsoundtechnologies.com/microBearingFill.php

If you chose to use sand, fill a cookie sheet with a layer of sand no more than 3/16" high and bake it in your oven 350 degrees until totally dry, an hour or longer depending upon the type of sand you purchase.

concrete blocks will be fine to elevate your speakers and will give your living room that "grad. student" aesthetic

paint them with a brush not spray paint to prevent chips & dust

Geoff- that reminds me of  MP Argument Clinic.

"Everything is arguable." No it's not!