Jackin the floor.

Hi Marc,

Truly you'll go to great lengths to improve your sound! And I thought that (considering) building 3 foot pillars through holes in my wooden floor was obsessive!

Whatever floats your boat I guess.

Question, though, that looks like a regular plasterboard ceiling - can your jacks really increase the rigidity of the floor above by pushing on that? Or did you cut it away such that they are directly in contact with the joists?

Cheers!

Richard.

P.S. Happy Birthday!!

Is it Mana ?

Is it fair to assume that you have restricted car access to the garage, a garage BTW thats about the size of our flat?

The floors in my ground floor listening rooom are suspended joists/floorboards, and sometimes as I walked across certain parts of the listening room floor, the door would rattle if it was not shut properly. Obviously this showed how flexible the floor actually was and although the system rack sits on a concrete section of floor where a fireplace used to be, the speakers were on the floorboards, and clearly weren't as stable as they could be as a result of this movement. I have relatively easy access into the cavity under my ground floor and I hammered thick wooden supports under the speaker positions to brace the floor joists and it worked a treat.

Cheers
Ade

Cheers Ade!

I've just been looking at the system pics thread - what lovely speakers they are too!

I think I'll brace the joists as you suggest, then maybe put an axle stand type arrangement underneath to put about 20kg(?) of force onto the underside of the braces.

If I stand next to a speaker and apply some weight to the floor, it dips such that the top of the speaker deflects towards me about a quarter of an inch!!

Cheers!

R.

"Truly you'll go to great lengths to improve your sound! And I thought that (considering) building 3 foot pillars through holes in my wooden floor was obsessive!"

Not obsessive at all! (Says he who is soon going to do exactly that in order to extract even better bass from the Ergo III's)

Mr Tibbs

Thanks R
I braced the floor when I had SBL's, but with the weight of NBLs now bearing down on them, the benefit is probably even greater. Also, as the floorboards are god knows how old, they weren't in ideal condition, so I replaced that area of floorboards with a square of flooring panel, which eliminated the problem of a speaker spike finding a gap between 2 boards when it's positioned, causing further stability problems

I've considered putting some more braces under the rest of the floor, but haven't got round to it yet.

Cheers
Ade

Good morning Ade,
I do hope that when you braced under the speakers that you considered a "damp proof membrane" of some kind to prevent the timber from getting damp and rotting (or worse still, leading to dry rot!)
Just a thought.......... I'd hate to see the NBL's suddenly drop by 3 feet and disappearing into the void!
How are you getting on with the babies after a few weeks with them?

Computers are supposed to work on 1's and 0's - in other words "Yes" or "No" - why does mine frequently say "Maybe"?......

[QUOTE]Originally posted by NaimThatTune:
Hi Marc,

Truly you'll go to great lengths to improve your sound! And I thought that (considering) building 3 foot pillars through holes in my wooden floor was obsessive!

I did that as well (18 inches though) probably the biggest upgrade I have done and the cheapest

Cheers
Trevor.

Hi Martin,
The braces are sat on concrete slabs, and just brace the floor joist. They do not support the floor, just stop any flexing, so even if they came away, the floor would not move. The cavity underneath is cool but dry, and the joists seemed to have lasted for the last 60-70 years without rotting or additional support, so I'm not anticipating any problems.

The NBL's are great. I think I would say they are the most satisfying single upgrade I've made. Scale, bass, detail and a much more 3-dimensional, room filling sound, not so fussy about positioning, gorgeous looks.

A cartridge is still on the shopping list, and a Dynavector looks the most likely option. I'd be interested in popping over with some vinyl for an LP12/Dynavector dem in the near future if convenient. The NBL dem sure did the business!

Cheers
Ade

Makes a lot of sense, Mark. I did something similar, but with a wall mount. Changing the wall mount from 1/2 inch drywall over 2X4 framed wall to the 10 inch thick concrete basement wall that sits behind it is something I've always thought made a lot of sense as a irreversable modification. It's hard to dispute which mount would hold the speaker more still.

This has turned out to be a fundamental improvement to the performance of the system in every way imaginable. All for $43.00 of hardware, drills, mitre box, trim and 10 hours of labor.

Guess I'll have to get the carpet and underlay up again, then!

Only 2 or 3 weeks ago it was all up to route the spurs under the floor.

Not too much fun when you have to move all the furniture to one end of the room...

Now, why did I buy such a heavy sofa??

Cheers!

Rich.

NaimThatTune:
I decided to map out the music room the day before in chalk. On the garage floor there is the exact placement of the speakers. Instead of going with 2 jacks(one on each side of the speakers), I wanted to get to the root of the problem. I wanted to support all directions of joist under the speakrs. I took 2f*2f treated(water proof)1 inch thick plywood and used that as the measure of support. I felt by going beyond in every direction, I would support the floor in all directions and just as important, more evenly.

Long time:
VERY FUNNY! I use SB3s under the DBLs. They do work a treat and have considered going to phase 2. I spent $700 dead Pres. for those things! This project cost me $200 bucks and as far as i am concerned. I am at phase 20....

gari:
You can't see it but, there is another space to the left.Total of three. My wife fits fine between the jacks and actually, I did fit to the right of her. I did have some worries at the first thought of this. I did need to adjust the garage door mech to only open as far as you see it in the picture. My car just fits under the lid.

Regards to all,

Marc

You're my hero, Marc!
David

Next project is to support the joist under the Fraim...Maybe today or tomorrow...

Has anyone done this???

Marc

I'd be interested to know how long it would take to suss something had changed if someone sneaked in during the night and whipped the props away. I speak as one who spent many years tweaking. Until my wife grew tired of my silly hifi games & began to test my ability to hear any difference with my eyes closed (on easily reversible tweaks). I never could reliably. Unless she was cheating of course? Record clamp blind tests on our TD160AB remain to haunt me to this day. I was so certain I could hear "night and day" differences. Eh? What? Pardon?

Nime

Everyone has the right to be wrong.

Nime:
About 2 notes of something familiar.

This morning I noticed that something changed over night(Mostly right channel). As usual, things settled in and there needed to be a half turn to tighten things up again..


"Everyone has the right to be wrong"
The best time to listen and learn.........
Damn! Why does ones perception have to be their reality???

Regards,
Marc

PS John, nice work on the wall.......

quote:

---

Originally posted by Ade Archer:
Hi Martin,
The braces are sat on concrete slabs, and just brace the floor joist. They do not support the floor, just stop any flexing, so even if they came away, the floor would not move. The cavity underneath is cool but dry, and the joists seemed to have lasted for the last 60-70 years without rotting or additional support, so I'm not anticipating any problems.

A cartridge is still on the shopping list, and a Dynavector looks the most likely option. I'd be interested in popping over with some vinyl for an LP12/Dynavector dem in the near future if convenient. The NBL dem sure did the business!
Cheers
Ade

---

Hi Ade, the point with the wooden braces was that if they are not isolated from the ground, they will draw in damp. Floor joists in older houses tend to sit on slate where they enter the walls which acts as a damp proof memrane . If you have added wooden supports that touch the joists and ground, you've effectivley bridged that damp proof membrane.

Regarding the cartidge, feel free to arrange a Dynavector demo whenever you like you have my numbers...
Away April 21st 'til May 16th and the house minder won't let you in!

Computers are supposed to work on 1's and 0's - in other words "Yes" or "No" - why does mine frequently say "Maybe"?......