The mesmerising wonder of Naim engineering.
Posted by: Sloop John B on 21 October 2017
As some of you mat have gathered form some of my posts here our house has been undergoing renovations and I have used the opportunity to go for wired Ethernet and dedicated mains.
Well after a long 5 months we are back again and the task to reassemble two tiers of fraim and a pair of SL2s was frankly beyond me (well the SL2s, I could probably manage the fraim) and I am one of the lucky ones who have Alastair and Andy from Signals as my dealer so Andy made the long journey from Suffolk to Dublin with various accoutrements in the back of his car to allow a re-envisioning of my music room.
What struck me as "we" ( in the loosest meaning of the plural) set up my Naim system again was the level of engineering that has gone in to Naim fraim and SL2s. Seeing a whole fraim stack being rebuilt really is a marvel, the thought and precision that went into the engineering of the supports - and then the added bits like finding the best orientation for the fraim glass.
But the SL2s take the biscuit (sorry), from the decoupling of the tweeter from the box to the orientation of the - what are they called, here's a picture
where one side of the 3 pronged "thingy" has slightly raised bumps on one side of it.
Marvellous engineering ( unfortunately not commercially sustainable with the SL2) and quite possibly not something that would be made in 2017. Reminds me a bit of the lyric from Cortex the Killer
"But they built up
with their bare hands
What we still can't do today"
Because I had become used to looking at my system it was a bit of an eye opener and a revelation to see it being set up again and admire the "love and engineering" that went in to them.
Well done Naim and thanks ( and thanks to Andy form Signals most especially).
I've just fallen in love all over again!
.sjb
Great looking system. I worry that my system and the SL2s are a distance from an ideal set up - but how would I know?
In answer to JoeRand, the point is to aim for perfection in engineering and set up. My model for this is the Grateful Dead and their Wall of Sound set up which they designed in the mid-70s. It produced brilliant concert sound and weighed 75 tons, although it turned out to be impractical for touring. It was powered by Macintosh tube amps so might count as potentially the largest hifi system ever assembled! When I saw them at Wembley in '91 I believe they were then using a system with a computerised element that allowed them to tailor the sound to the acoustics of the venue. The point is that you set your ambitions high and just go for it, if you can.
joerand posted:Nice post and happy to hear your results. Like the NY quote as well.
On the other hand, I can't help coming away with the notion "why should quality hi-fi set-up be difficult for the end user or necessarily require a dealer's trip to the home?"
I'm less inclined to consider finicky set-up caveats as marvelous engineering. A wonder of Naim engineering, perhaps.
I have to agree, if it so difficult to set up, it can’t be regarded as good engineering, it’s poor engineering.
However, the cynic in me has other ideas. The dealer is hardly going to travel 300 miles and screw it all together in fifteen minutes, is he.
I’ve seen it so many times. I've even done a similar thing myself.
fatcat posted:joerand posted:
However, the cynic in me has other ideas. The dealer is hardly going to travel 300 miles and screw it all together in fifteen minutes, is he.
I’ve seen it so many times. I've even done a similar thing myself.
Yeah you're probably right now that I come to think of it, Andy is an awful slacker not to have done this (as well as re-torquing) before the kettle boiled.
1. remove bass boxes from the packaging. Loosely fit spikes and nuts to the bases - leave a decent length of thread to level properly later.
2. Attach the tweeter arms to the bases. Ensure the arms are fully seated - failure to do so will give you big problems later. Tighten arms so they are vertical and stay still but are moveable. Best to push down on the arms when tightening to ensure they remain well seated.
3. Ensure crossovers are fitted correctly. tighten fixing screws so they just start to pinch rubber decoupling doughnuts. Do not squash them.
4. position speakers so their backs are as close to the wall as possible without fouling crossover cables.
5. line up a spirit level along the top front of the cabinet. Tip cabinet forwards so it rests on front pair of spikes. Adjust spikes so cabinet is level side to side when tipped slightly forwards. Tighten spike nuts.
6. lower rear and adjust spikes at rear so cabinet is level front to back (use spirit level).
7. because of the leaf spring at the rear, getting the spikes perfectly level at the back is tricky. A tip is to lean the cabinet forwards on the front spikes and then gently lower the cabinet at the back. As the spikes make contact with the floor, if one is longer than the other it will push the tweeter arm one way or the other. Adjust spikes and repeat until there is no lateral movement of the tweeter arm when the spikes touch the floor. Tighten.
8. Gently push on front of cabinet to ensure it springs perfectly back and forth. If there's any lateral rocking, go back and repeat step 7.
9. Place pips and washers into holes on base box top plate. Ensure that the washers are the right way up - there are tiny raised nodules on the three washer arms - these should face upwards.
10. Loosen the front tweeter surround plates on the top box. sometimes they can get stuck, so once the allen bolts and washers have been loosened, push the plate from in side the box to unstick it.
11. Ensure the interface plates are clean and free of dust, wool etc.. , then mount the top box onto the lower base box.
12. position the tweeter arm so that you can align the surround so the tweeter is as concentric as possible. Tighten the bolts on the tweeter surround.
13. do the final positioning on the tweeter so it is flush with the tweeter surround on the top box.
14. Do the final tightening on the bolts securing the tweeter arms to the base ensuring the tweeter remains flush. As tight as possible is best - ensure you don't strip the hex head though...
15. plug in the crossover cables to the respective drivers
16. plug in speaker cables.
17. do a final check. A gentle push on the box top should see the cabinet rock gently a few times back and forth and the tweeter appear to bob a bit.
18. attach the grilles ensuring that there is a small 2mm gap between the grille and the lower cabinet.
19. Sit back and enjoy!
Mind you at least I can understand these instructions now!
.sjb
Nah, that Andy only came over for the Guinness.
I could rebuild my system, but as I suffer from arthritis it's not something I want to do, so I drag poor old Andy over every year or so & get him to do it. He's a jolly good sort and makes an absolutely spiffing job of things. I have this theory that hi-fi cabling unplugs itself at night & they all do a little convoluted dance together before plugging themselves back in. So it's certainly a boost for the system to have it all untangled, the Fraim re-fettled, and everything popped back together neatly. Of course, you can opt for a "neater" engineering solution, something that's just plonk down, plug in and away you go. But if you're to get the best out of a Naim setup then you've got to do it carefully.
