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Speaker spike feet?

I recently acquired a nice older hifi system with Aerial Acoustics 7B tower speakers.I am not an audiophile. The speakers have heavy iron bases on them but there are no feet of any sort on these bases. I emailed the owner/designer at Aerial and he sent me a schematic of the bases which show that they originally had spike feet. He said he could provide the spikes at minimal cost. I was afraid to ask what minimal meant since I seem to remember that these bases cost $400 when new. (I'm still getting accustomed to what things cost in the audiophile world.)

I am wondering if I really need the spikes. These speakers sit on a carpeted floor with hardwood on typical joist construction floor. They sound quite good to me but if spikes would help in any way and I can get them cheap then I will do so.

I'll ask Aerial how much theirs cost but I'm pretty sure that stainless steel tripod (for photography) spikes will fit the 3/8-16 threads in these bases. The cost would be about $40 for those. Maybe the actual Aerial ones wouldn't cost any more but they are longer and look very sharp which makes me wonder about floor/carpet damage since these speakers weigh around 110 pounds each.
n80
geoffkait's avatar
geoffkait
14,147 posts
 
Obviously, if you look hard enough you can find somebody somewhere who doesn’t follow the pattern. Somebody who like rubber, somebody who likes Sorbothane, somebody who likes lead. These things happen. He’s an outlier. Isolation is important and effective even for cement slabs since the entire building is moving.
frozentundra
129 posts
 
N80;

Or Journeyman Machinist 

How do the spikes sound?
could you tell a difference or “ so so”?

It was obvious with mine? 

Ps: Next set make out of a M4 tool steel hardened to 55-60 Rockwell & pint ground to 32 rms
lol

jeff
frozentundra
129 posts
 
N80;

Take pics of your setup!
Ariel are nice speakers & Iron base is a new one for me?

jeff


n80 OP
1,227 posts
 
jeff, I honestly can't say I noticed a big difference.

Right now, making this sort of subjective assessment is very hard. I'm one who agrees that a lot of things affect my ability to judge music quality from what mood I happen to be in to which model of leaf blower my neighbor is running outside my window. I also think it is very easy to internalize what I hear from others ("it will sound better with spikes") and to yield to my expectation of improved quality based on having taken the time to make these i.e. I've gone to the trouble to make them, surely it must sound better. And then I fight these expectations trying to be objective....and the end result is that I don't know.

I'm listening right now and they sound marvelous. Better than before? Probably. A revelation? No.

As for the OEM bases, they are rectangular channel steel, 4 pieces welded together and there is clearly something in them because they are heavy. I know they are OEM because Aerial sent me a schematic.

I am no machinist. You can tell that by looking closely at the picture I posted of them. I have a grinding wheel, a drill press and an angle grinder. All of them old. And no training. Any pretense at craftsmanship in my posts above was purely for humor.

n80 OP
1,227 posts
 
geoffkait, I wasn't sure for a fact that they are rubber but they look and feel like firm black rubber. So I looked back at the schematic Micheal Kelly sent me and it does say rubber there.
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