SL2 Placement

Have you re-torqued the drivers and suspension bar? Tweeters too?

It may well be that the bay is sucking out the bass. Mine are against a flat wall and are toed in very slightly so that the outsides are 5mm further from the wall than the insides. This gives a more solid imaging than having them straight ahead. 

I’d lift them out, mark the floor where the spikes are now and then put them back in a toed in position. Even without perfect setup you will hear what this does to both bass and imaging. If it gives the improvement you are seeking you can then set them up properly in the new position. 

I’m assuming that relocating them against a solid flat wall is impossible, even though it’s likely to give a better result. 

I’ve not setup SL2s but NBLs gave a significantly different sound just by moving them 5 mm further in or out. Initial setup was by a dealer and the distance to the wall was found without spikes, marked and the spikes fitted. I later experimented myself and they were spot on as he’d set them for wall distance behind at 5.5cm but I could improve their latteral placement, which I did before retesting the wall gap. I had Roy Harper’s January Man playing and could hear the emotion in his voice change as I moved the speakers.

Can you go a bit wider on yours? You’re trying to drive the room and it sounds like you have a cancellation at your listening position.. Put something under the spikes so you can move them easier, you can remove it when you think you’ve got it right. 

Because the bass of the SL2 is designed so that it works "with" the room, it does mean that where the room is not quite "right" then you can sometimes find that you are sat just where the bass isn't. As HH says above, the bay may be causing some issues too. In this case, quite a degree of experimentation in both speaker position and also seating position really helps. Walk around the room and get an idea of where the bass sounds right. For example, in my room there's a position where the bass is just about perfect.  Only trouble is, it's not quite where the sofa likes to be, which is positioned in a slight null point, so I tend to move it forwards or backwards out of the null when I sit down to listen to the system.  

Richard

Can you explain what you mean about the bass working 'with' the room?

Just curious how they are different to other designs. No intention of changing mine, the bass has just improved with a DR upgrade on my old 555 for the NDS, never had to move them a millimetre!

Bruce 

Bruce, what I mean is that due to their design, the room will have a much greater impact on how well they work compared to the usual reflex designs intended for usebaway from room boundaries.

In simple terms, bass is boosted against a wall with any speaker, some like the SL2 depending on it, and others giving a more level performance without it.

As Richard said, it could well be a null - a cancellation point arising from reflections in the room. The only ways of fixing that are moving listening position, moving speaker positions, or both, and/or adding room treatment (bass absorbers) at appropriate points to stop the reflections that cause the cancellation.

I think HH and Richard are both spot on: try a little toe-in (never liked it in my room though it did improve stereo focus a little in the sweet spot), but above play with where you’re seated if you can. Don’t be frightened to pull the a little closer together either, early on, and playing with just one variable ata time: your room (bay) acoustics might meand this gets the standing waves to be more obliging despite losing some of the sold wall behind contribution.

Thanks Guys, it’s clear the SL2’s are producing a better (deeper) bass than my SBL’s ever did....  Ita just not getting to me.... it’s a really tough room to reconfigure and moving the boxes would lose me the dedicate spur I had put in. 

I’ve got wood Venetian Blinds in the bay and they look stunning but a hard reflective surface... I’m considering some roman blinds which I’m sure would help out ?  Or would the soft fabric suck even more bass into the bay ??

Ill start with a bit of Toe in and see where I get to....

thanks guys

Mark

Buster Clayton posted:

I’ve got wood Venetian Blinds in the bay and they look stunning but a hard reflective surface... I’m considering some roman blinds which I’m sure would help out ?  Or would the soft fabric suck even more bass into the bay ??

 

Unlikely to have any major effect on bass, but might improve higher frequencies in which range they may be more absorbent, though that would likely be more significant if the window was to the sides or rear.

Persevere Mark, they are well worth it. I have an identical system to you and when right, they are magical but fussy. May I suggest moving a fabric arm chair into the bay window between the speakers. I had slight bass loss/blurring  until I removed a grandfather clock from the corner of a room and replaced with fabric arm chair. Who'd a thought it was affecting the sound?. I also have strip blinds and thick curtains drawn over the multiple windows when listening. Bass is strong, deep and well focused,, not boomy or fat in the slightest from both vinyl and digital

I’ve actually just ordered a pair of fabric sofas to replace my leather sofa’s

one sits in the bay the other for me to sit and listen from....

Buster Clayton posted:

I’ve actually just ordered a pair of fabric sofas to replace my leather sofa’s

one sits in the bay the other for me to sit and listen from....

 

I've just done the opposite. Replaced a fabric sofa for an expensive leather recliner and totally transformed the sound for the worse. Marvellous.

Dougie Danger posted:

Buster Clayton posted:

I’ve actually just ordered a pair of fabric sofas to replace my leather sofa’s

one sits in the bay the other for me to sit and listen from....

 

I've just done the opposite. Replaced a fabric sofa for an expensive leather recliner and totally transformed the sound for the worse. Marvellous.

I agree! I had the same bad experience as you, replacing my fabric sofa to expensive leather but I never went back, I got used to living with the disadvantage, maybe in the future I will find a better solution.... leather is bad for sound

May be download some 40 - 70 htz test tones and move your listening seat backwards and forwards to determine where the null  points are and the impact of soft furnishings experiments in the bay.

I also use a track by Eivør called Trøllabundin (on Tidal) to give my woofers a workout.  The bass should be very deep and sonorous.

Hi all,the SL2 interface plates/suspension mounts and bass unit bolts (3.6nm) appear to lose their torque regularly ---which is due in my experience to the progressive deformation of the muck metal captive nuts inbedded on the insides of the cabinet ,the tops of which slowly go more and more concave and eventually the tops part from the threaded shank . I had to replace one of mine using a steel version but I noted the remaining ones very quite deformed (stretched),my 2 cents worth,Chris 

michael17 posted:

May be download some 40 - 70 htz test tones and move your listening seat backwards and forwards to determine where the null  points are and the impact of soft furnishings experiments in the bay.

I also use a track by Eivør called Trøllabundin (on Tidal) to give my woofers a workout.  The bass should be very deep and sonorous.

 

Or better still, REW software (free) and a measuring microphone (unavoidable cost if you don’t have one, of the order of £100) - that’s what I used to assess what was happening in my room and find the best solution, far quicker than listening tests, and helps understand what is actually going on.

Dougie Danger posted:

Buster Clayton posted:

I’ve actually just ordered a pair of fabric sofas to replace my leather sofa’s

one sits in the bay the other for me to sit and listen from....

 

I've just done the opposite. Replaced a fabric sofa for an expensive leather recliner and totally transformed the sound for the worse. Marvellous.

We're just about to go from fabric to a leather sofa. Hope my SL2s will be Ok with the change! 

Tread carefully!!

rackkit posted:

Dougie Danger posted:

Buster Clayton posted:

I’ve actually just ordered a pair of fabric sofas to replace my leather sofa’s

one sits in the bay the other for me to sit and listen from....

 

I've just done the opposite. Replaced a fabric sofa for an expensive leather recliner and totally transformed the sound for the worse. Marvellous.

We're just about to go from fabric to a leather sofa. Hope my SL2s will be Ok with the change! 

You have been warned. 

Here is my outfit which works perfectly as a workaround for my leather sofa:

But - and this is back serious: I have a large leather sofa, and have no issues. There is a big fabric carpet in front of it though and the room is spacious.

I can imagine that a leather sofa is an issue in a room having only hard surfaces.

You can always play with the circumstances by using some towels, blankets etc ...

Mark can you post a picture. You need some fabric curtains as its likely your window is leaking bass out. I am  assuming it’s a reasonably large window? This is a easy to solve problem. Also do you have a rug or carpet on floor. Also Fraim chips are helpful as is speaker to floor interface. I have had this issue before with SBLS 

Regards 

Yes the bay is a decent size with a leather sofa in there just now (fabric sofas on order) 

i’m Planning on some roman blinds to hopefully help with the acoustics of the room...

I have a deep pile wool carpet with a thick underlay 

stood straight in the firing line of either speaker the bass is powerful.... in the middle quite thin

ill try to sort out how to upload pictures here.... can’t work it out just now !

thanks

Mark 

The bass is stronger when straight ahead as you’re likely getting corner reinforcement. Can you move wider? Naim speakers can work far apart sometimes 

Buster Clayton posted:

Yes the bay is a decent size with a leather sofa in there just now (fabric sofas on order) 

i’m Planning on some roman blinds to hopefully help with the acoustics of the room...

I have a deep pile wool carpet with a thick underlay 

stood straight in the firing line of either speaker the bass is powerful.... in the middle quite thin

ill try to sort out how to upload pictures here.... can’t work it out just now !

 

thanks

Mark 

As the bass is pretty much omnidirectional, the ‘straight in the firing line’ observation is potentially misleading - th elack of bass atbthe listening position is not from directionality, but very likely from cancellation, and/or where you can hear strong bass it is from nodes causing reinforcement. For solution see earlier observations.

As for picture, a sketch showing room shape and layout would be most useful.