Experience with Townshend Seismic Podiums on Concrete Floor (they're great)

@hilde45 and @mapman .  To the points you have made above.

  I did not include vibrations transmitted to the speakers that have its origins outside the confines of the listening room as a 4th type of kinetic motion because the medium through which those vibrations are transmitted is the room flooring.  So my type 3 above is inclusive of anything that is transmitted to the speaker via the flooring.

In addition, I don't think anyone has said that such vibrations are not audible.  But I did say that they are probably orders of magnitude less significant on concrete than they are on typical wood subflooring over a crawl space or in a second floor application.  In my estimation and in my experience, the worst offender is usually type 2 if one is on wood flooring.  If not, then it would appear that type 3 vibration is the more significant.

The problem here is that we can't determine with any degree of certainty which of the 3 types is most significant in our particular setting.  Another problem is that addressing one type of kinetic energy may exacerbate the other two.  This is why I don't hear many people claiming spikes are the answer.  

The answer here is finding a way to rapidly (instantaneously would be ideal) convert these three (or 4 if you insist) types of kinetic energy to heat.  The idea of isolation only works if you are isolating from an external source (seismic, as example).  If you are talking about type 1 energy, you might address the movement of the speaker using spikes.  But the law of conservation of mass and energy tells us that the energy that wanted to move the speaker and now can't, must express that energy in some other form.  So spikes are converting the type 1 energy to a combination of type 2 energy plus heat.  Thus, if type 2 energy is worse in terms of audible effects than type 1 energy, spikes could make your speakers sound worse. And spikes can't do anything at all to address type 2 and type 3 vibration. 

This same argument can be applied to products designed to address type 3 or type 2 energy.  Unless a particular device is capable of converting all three types of energy to heat, and doing so rapidly and efficiency, the device is robbing Peter to pay Paul.  

I really think the manufactures that are super engineering their speaker cabinets have recognize what I am saying above.  That is what these super rigid cabinets are doing.  They are efficiently and rapidly converting type 2 kinetic energy to heat.

For those us that don't want to pay more for our speakers than we did for our house, we are forced to look for products like the Townsend for a poor man's solution, and the reality is that we are going to have to try some different types to see (hear) what works best in our particular setting. 

I have owned the Seismic platforms for a couple years and they are transforming .

Prior to the Podiums I was using spikes with Combak Harmonic footer. 

It is one of the few audio products that is universally praised by people who actually own them. Yes they are expensive but chances are they make up less than 10-15 percent of total system cost. They’re improvement is actually a great value. The beauty is every single piece of your equipment benefits and changes in cables,fuses,power supplies, are much easier hear. 
My biggest takeaway from them are the space around the instruments and not only the depth of the stage but the actual placement of the players. Live recordings are especially impressive as you will hear the audience in front and the singer a few feet back and guitar player a couple more feet back and to the left  and the drummer 12 ft behind the singer but 8 ft behind the guitar player etc. I guess you would call it layering . 
All the other goodies apply, texture in vocals, improved bass control, etc.

I do have a golden ratio room which helps, it is a converted garage with a cement floor. 2x12 floor joist filled with foam built on top of the existing cement slab. I knew where my system was going to be so much more than typical cross bracing etc. 

Finished flooring is LVP with cork backing . It floats so probably not the best but it looks great and easy to take care and self installed   Could be another reason I felt I had such an improvement with the Podiums  

The Townshend folks are awesome to work with and will work hard to make sure you can afford your Podiums . I went thru all Herbies, Stillpoints,Combak Harmonic ,chain . Save up your money and buy the Townshend Podiums .You won’t have to worry about selling them for 50 cents on a dollar in a couple of years!!

I read the Townsend website write up on their seismic pods and sorry not buying it.

....Speaker interaction with suspended plywood floors is a very common and way more significant acoustic issue. All one has to do is jump up and down in a room and see if anything moves or vibrates to know.

@mapman By "it" what are you referring to? The seismic factor alone? What?

@brownsfan noted three types of issues -- without mentioning the seismic one:

1. movement of the speaker cabinet back and forth and side to side due to Newtonian action reaction caused by the driver motion
2. cabinet vibration also due to the drivers motion
3. floor resonance being transferred back and forth between the speaker and flooring until it finally dissipates.

You are using Isoacoustic isolation and you say they help. Might the Townshends simply be doing what those devices do?

Are you mentioning "jumping up and down" on the floor as an adequate test of whether the kind of vibration capable of smearing midrange and treble are is present? It seems too crude a test, no? Not sure what the geology textbooks say on that one.

I read the Townsend website write up on their seismic pods and sorry not buying it. I’m sure they can make a difference in some cases like other similar products can but it doesn’t all add up.

I do use much less costly Isoacoustics isolation stands under smaller speakers on my upper levels with suspended plywood floors where floor interactions are always problematic and they make a big difference there cleaning up the midrange that gets obscured by the bass otherwise. I don’t bother to use them at foundation level with dense carpet and pad over concrete in that I do not hear a difference there.

I live in a modestly active seismic area. I was a Geology major in college and did award winning research modeling seismic activity in grad school. So I do know something about seismic activity. It might be an issue in some cases and in certain geological conditions but certainly not always. There can be a wide difference there but I guess that’s cutting hairs too much in the interest of selling product. Still you never know for sure unless you try….

If they work and one feels they are worth it, more power to you. Speaker interaction with suspended plywood floors is a very common and way more significant acoustic issue. All one has to do is jump up and down in a room and see if anything moves or vibrates to know.

@cd318  Thanks for confirming that my thought process is not utter lunacy.  It's been 50 years since my last physics course, so I am a bit rusty on some of this stuff.

Maybe this is why some companies, Magico  comes to mind, go to seemingly absurd lengths in building essentially inert cabinets.  

@hilde45 it is always good to do a reality check on one's objectivity.  I suspect that when we hear differences that rise well above the "well, it sounds different, I think" level of tweaks, we are not just fooling ourselves.  I've had a few occasions where I have been convinced that something couldn't possibly work, then found it did work and work well.  I think these things really run contrary to confirmation bias.  Kudos to you for giving these things a try!

For people with downfiring drivers I wonder if the Townshend Pods, which I imaging would be used in a manner similar to Isoacoustics Gaia pods, wouldn't solve the problem. Also the Corners that he sells are interesting looking.  I wonder if there's an advantage to two "Seismic Load Cells" (his name) per corner over one.  

@surfcat "Makes me wonder if every single system, especially those with floor standers, would automatically benefit."

I have to say I agree. 

My challenge, as a true blue skeptic, is to keep listening critically. Am I in an infatuation period? Is my thinking and hearing clouded by the sunk costs fallacy? I am trying to be open to the idea that all of this is confirmation bias. I suspect that's not true, but I've not had it a long time, yet.

@brownsfan

In trying to think my way through this problem, I’ve thought in terms of 3 different types of unwanted kinetic energy that are undoubtedly problematic to some degree.

1. movement of the speaker cabinet back and forth and side to side due to Newtonian action reaction caused by the driver motion
2. cabinet vibration also due to the drivers motion
3. floor resonance being transferred back and forth between the speaker and flooring until it finally dissipates.

I agree.

There’s clearly more than just one form of resonance at play here.

To make things even more complicated these levels of resonance might all differ according to playback volume and speaker placement.

Unless I am missing something, this all tells me that that speaker cabinet resonance (2) was the main culprit. It also tells me that the Townsend product is somehow draining and dissipating that speaker cabinet resonance quickly.

I’d agree too.

There’s not a single loudspeaker on earth that doesn’t suffer from it.

Some far more than others, obviously.

Even a traditional design used to combat cabinet resonance such as the thin wall lossy cabinet employed by Harbeth/Spendor or a more modern one such as Q Acoustics Concept Series gelcore cabinet/ lossy stand might benefit from some further form of isolation/decoupling.

Yes agreed once again, no 2 is critically important.

Sprung wooden floors in particular, might just be the least helpful surface to place a pair of vibrating towers.

@hilde45 ​​​​​@jtcf 

Thanks for the responses. I did see on their website that Townshend also offers Seismic Bars for bottom ported speakers as noted by surfcat. 

I will also research the Primacoustics platforms as noted. 

Hi hilde45

Your description of the changes pretty much precisely coincides with mine, Sopra 2 on a hardwood floor.  I didn't have space for the Podiums so after an email exchange with Mr. Townshend I purchased the Bars.  The improvement was dramatic, even a little shocking, when considered that the systems sounded pretty good before, or so I thought, and all I did was swap out the Pods.  Makes me wonder if every single system, especially those with floor standers, would automatically benefit.  Not trying to sell anyone with that line, btw.  It's just that I was amazed at what it did to my audio.  I used Isoaccoustics Pods before the Townshend Bars

@relayer101 I don't want to hijack hilde45's thread but I also have bottom ported speakers that according to the research I've done don't react well with the Townshend podiums.I've ordered Primacoustics platforms which are supposed to arrive Wednesday. I posted a video( looong and tedious) on hilde's other thread that demonstrated good results with a bottom ported sub.I'll tack it on to the other thread or start a new one and tag you with the results. I'll post a link for you.

@ozzy — thanks for the link to your review!
@relayer101 — I saw someone on another forum asking about down-firing ports. I can’t remember what they said, so you might need to search the web a bit on that question. It’s a good one.
@snilf — I got a nice deal from their representative that made it more affordable, FWIW. Still a lot more than the Isoacoustics — and way more than what you have! If I had not liked them, I would have simply paid shipping to return them. I’m selling another piece of gear to (mostly) cover the cost of these. Now that I know I want to keep them, that is. The reasoning I couldn’t escape was this -- "Whatever these cost, they’re still maximizing money spent on everything else." The only question was, "Maximizing by how much? 1% 5%?" The answer is hard to put in percentage terms but was basically, "By a degree I’ll find impossible to forget if I send these podia back."

As @brownsfan and @smandlej point out, the wood floor situation makes the podia even more relevant, so another reason I’m sticking with these is that they allow me to move my speakers to another room — or use the podia in another room — without having to consider another solution.

I want to add a shoutout to @millercarbon who wrote accurately and articulately about these products a while back. At the time, I was nowhere near having a system together, so the very idea of spending $1k on platforms seemed beyond the pale.

As an owner of Townshend podiums myself, the clue is in the full name "Seismic". A concrete floor in an area of seismic activity, even minor, will not isolate your speakers fron nature's effects. The use of spikes coupled to a concrete floor will exasperate matters as Max explains in his youtube video. That's my two cents worth and I am keeping mine because my wood floors on the upper floor where my system is installed ensures that I am not entertaining the entire house.

This is a really interesting subject, and one that my own personal experience has taught me ought not to be ignored.  I am more than a little surprised that @hilde45  experienced the magnitude of improvement that he did, given that he is working with what I consider to be the best case scenario, that being carpet over concrete.  When you think about a problem, and the experimental results aren't what you expect, you need to pay attention and learn.  It means you are not thinking about the problem correctly. 

 In trying to think my way through this problem, I've thought in terms of 3 different types of unwanted kinetic energy that are undoubtedly problematic to some degree.  

1. movement of the speaker cabinet back and forth and side to side due to Newtonian action reaction caused by the driver motion
2. cabinet vibration also due to the drivers motion
3. floor resonance being transferred back and forth between the speaker and flooring until it finally dissipates.  

It has been my experience that that last type of unwanted kinetic energy (3) can be very bad.  Carpet over concrete presents a situation that is orders of magnitude less prone to transferring kinetic energy back and forth from and to the cabinet than is carpet over wood.  If I recall correctly he tried spikes, which should minimize front to back and lateral cabinet movement (1), and yet, he found the Townsend product to be a substantial obvious improvement over what he had used previously.  Unless I am missing something, this all tells me that that speaker cabinet resonance (2) was the main culprit.  It also tells me that the Townsend product is somehow draining and dissipating that speaker cabinet resonance quickly.   I guess I am going to have to learn more about this product.  $1500 is not exactly lunch money but it is far less than I have already put into fixing my problem.

By the way, I've used spikes, I've used sorbothane feet, and I've used Herbie's gliders.  The gliders were head and shoulders above the sorbotthane and the spikes.  Now I wonder if the Townsends can get me a bit more.

I have carpet on underlay on concrete in my HT and engineered timber on underlay in my living room. Would love to try these podiums in both areas to experience the same results as found here by the OP. Nice results…

hilde45: congratulations! I’ve been curious about Townshend podiums for a couple of years now, but remain unwilling to shell out for them. Your testimonial, and ozzy’s too, bring me that much closer.

But let me share my own experience with acoustic decoupling (I have walnut floors, not concrete; spikes turn the floors into uncontrolled passive radiators). A friend has the IsoAcoustics Gaia, and let me try them. They were certainly an improvement over spikes or nothing at all, and for the reasons you both catalog here. But I’m cheap; the Gaia were also more than I wanted to spend.

So I tried sorbothane feet purchased on eBay; they’re attached to threads that fit the spike holes on my tower speakers. Wow! Better than the Gaia, and again, for all the reasons mentioned here. The speakers wobble when provoked, but I’m past the age of children, and my dog is well-behaved. In fact, from what I can tell from Youtube videos, the sorbothane does very much the same thing, in terms of wobble, as the Townshend podiums.

They cost me less than $60 for all eight of them. Just sayin’.

Interesting post. I have Vandersteen Treo's that have a down firing port for the bass drivers. Currently have them mounted on IsoAcoustics ISO-Puck 76's on a wood over concrete floor. 

Any comments on how I would accommodate the Townshend Seismic Podiums for this type of a speaker? Thanks.

https://forum.audiogon.com/discussions/townshend-seismic-isolation-podium-platform-review

I agree. Here is a link to my review of them.

ozzy

Thanks for posting your impressions. I have a pair coming for my Fyne F703 speakers.

A friend with active ATC speakers (SCM50ASLT) went from Iso Acoustic Gaias to Townshend Podiums. He told me the improvement wasn't subtle. Two to three times the cost but he felt it was more than worth it.

We'll see. Glad to hear they worked out so well in the OP's system.

After doing a lot of reading and video watching myself I think solutions from other companies are going to look virtually the same on an accelerometer but sound different from the listening position.One thing everyone seems to be in agreement on is the Townshend's superior soundstaging.I like the wide plinth and ease of leveling.

@jtcf Between the detailed and earnest comments here and the reviewers I found online who were not just cheerleaders, I thought they would be worth a serious trial. they did not disappoint. I suppose those with Isoacoustics or other solutions might make the argument that I could have done the same thing for about 1/3 the price, and I cannot rebut that without a trial. That said, I like the look of these podiums and I like their easy, 4-way adjustability and the fact they have a platform. 

@carlsbad It took me a while to see this point -- specifically, that the fact I had concrete floor did not obviate the usefulness of the podiums.

So you decided to go for it.Seems like you made a great choice and have no regrets. Excellent:-)

I use them.  I have wood over concrete.

However, the springs pretty much insulate the speakers from the floor so it doesn't matter what the floor it, they are excellent.

I've posted this before but physics points to spring isolation as the right answer. 

Jerry