Vibration and Isolation at a budget?

Keep in mind Piper sells Mapleshade.

Audiofeil,

I believe I made that clear. My above post and this one are relevant to defending a well intentioned and exceedingly generous man and his work from illconsidered smear. It is also an attempt to inform similar situations. Neither Pierre nor myself are likely to get rich any time soon on the profits of IsoBlock sales.

Output,

cynicism is, by definition, in the interpretation of the facts. It is all too easy to assume an attitiude of distrust of those in business. If you ponder the economics you might find cause to reconsider. If the cost of four V Pads is $8, $24 is actually well below the typical 5 to 10 times parts cost markup enabling a product to be made availabe through normal distribution venues and for a company to stay in business and continue to provide a service.

The fact that you choose Pierre, who abhors inflated pricing, as your example of PT Barnum's edict, is inappropriate, to say the least. Pierre goes out of his way to come up with cheap and elegant answers to the challenges of music reproduction, cuts his prices in deference to the customer and to the exclusion of the usual profit reserved for dealers such as myself let alone distributors, fills his catalogue with free tweeks, makes himself available for questions on the phone, and offers a 30 day money back guarantee to top it off.

The following is a quote from his catalogue:

"After lots of tests with flexible suspension islolation mounts, I evolved the IsoBLock specifically for our maple platforms." ... " IsoBlocks are a rubber/cork/rubber laminate whose size and number of laminations I tuned by ear to give just the right vertical, horizontal, and torsional resonant frequencies for best isolation."

I find no misrepresentation in that statement. Those interested can judge for themselves. Certainly, there is nothing stopping someone from driving to their nearest HVAC supply store, buying some V Pads, cutting them up (assuming you have a band saw) and gluing them together. Just be sure to keep track of your gas, driving and work time, and figure in a little something for Pierre for taking the time to optimize the configuration, and then tell me $24 is exhorbitant.

I hope I've made it clear that, for me, this is not just about Mapleshade. They just happen to be a partcularly ironic example of this syndrome.

I tried EAR L-021 feet under an Aqvox phono stage and my Cornet 2; there was a significant improvement in mid-range and treble clarity with no loss of bass.

Available from Michael Percy $2.50 each.

RE: Pierre Sprey, the "fighter mafia guy": I bought his 2" unfinished maple platform for my turntable for $75 even tho' I made the 1 1/2" thick maple shelves for my rack myself a few years ago. I've been known as a woodworker around here since year 2000. After I factored in a trip to the sawmill, bench time and wear on my elderly body $75 was a bargain. I also blew a fortune, $25, on a set of iso-blocks. Call me crazy but finding them myself (I was aware of the HVAC connection) rather than pointing and clicking at my computer held no appeal. And the combo works.

You can read my upcoming review at http://www.dagogo.com/DIYHeartland.html
probably either the 1st or 16th of August.

I'm unpaid and, other than the expensive components I get for review, I shell out my own money for my DIY tweaks, mods and components. No shilling here.

Piper,
You've made your position with Mapleshade quite clear in both this and the balance of your other advertisements (oops I mean posts) in the threads.

Thanks for the information.

Michael Percy also sells Audio Points which I believe are the cheapest good solid brass cones and a bit cheaper than the Mapleshade and Walker cones. If cheap is the goal, any cones will be better than none and there are cheaper ones.

Feil,

Evidently, not everyone follows my ads as closely as you do. ;-)