Energy damping or energy transfer?

1. How about putting that inner tube in a solid box with the inner tube inflated just enought to stick above the top of the box so that the shelf that the TT sits on still floats slightly above the box, but the box itself restricts any lateral type movements that result from vibrations.

That's almost exactly what I'm using. Only difference is that the top of the platform is slightly lower (~1/8") than the top of the box, but there's a big enough gap that the platform doesn't touch the box. It began life as a sandbox. I recently dumped the sand and stuck a 16" BMX tire tube in there. As I said, not elegant, but if it works...

2. Acknowledging Krell man and Stehno's assertion that "nothing can stop airborn vibrations", what if you had a large dust cover that could cover the entire TT and rest on the shelf itself and then weight that down with something quick? Would that work in helping stop airborn vibrations?

I've had similar thoughts, maybe putting a turntable inside a cabinet, & then isolating the 'table from the cabinet/shell. Rega recommends listening to their turntables with the lid on. I would guess that this is to isolate the cartridge & arm from airborne vibration. Consensus on the web is that the lid resonates and transmits airborne vibrations to the plinth & the rest of the 'table, which is sonically detrimental. I prefer listening with the lid off myself.

Brent

Cbrentc,

LOL ....your thoughts make me think that someone should extend their noise cancelling headphones into a device to cancel vibrations....all you need is a 3 axis accelerometer tied to the device you want to stabilize and then a negative feedback loop to a 3 axis vibration servo that actively vibrates the device in the opposite way and cancels out all vibration ...airborne or otherwise.....this is the kind of stuff which is used in inertial guidance systems...it would not be cheap! (Of course the device would need its own internal damping...but this is common already)

Worth a patent perhaps?

Shadorne, in fact the vibration servo device could be another small speaker installed in the stand or support device! Brillant idea!
Bob P.

What would be the resolution and the bandwidth of the servo?

It's been our experience that all different products perform differently, and even can be different in various applications.
Primarily, the idea of vibration transfer would be aimed at taking the vibrations away from the equipment and down into a larger mass which is capable of dissipating the vibrational energy.
The idea of local damping would be aimed at trying to dissipate the vibrational energy right there at the equipment.
Basically, the difference in need would dictate the product used, because if the need is greater than the local damping product used can provide, then the overload of vibration will be reflected back into the components as the Zener Viscoelastic Model demonstrates.
In a highly vibration-laden environment such as an audio listening room, it is very likely that any small viscoelastic product would be overloaded very quickly, and thus return the vibrations into the components, causing smear.
To deal with large amounts of vibrational energy, a means to transfer the energy to something which has the capacity to dissipate those vibrations more effectively(large mass, house, earth) might be a better choice in many applications.
There are products which are designed to do this.
Some are more effective than others.