Townshend Audio ones Through

My transactions with John Hannant over the past couple of years have been nothing but extremely positive. After reaching out to Townshend’s U.S.A. distributor and discovering I knew more about the Seismic products than did he, I contacted John.

I did a lot of figuring and planning before contacting John, and in my first order (of three, so far) asked for a set of 6 Pods fitted with the "top cap" used in the Seismic Speaker Bar, with a hole drilled in the top for a bolt to pass through. I requested that because my intent was to bolt the Pods onto the tripod-style outrigger stand Sound Anchors makes for my Eminent Technology LFT-8b loudspeaker, the stand drilled and fitted with spikes. Very similar to the stand SA make for Vandersteen speakers.

John attempted to dissuade me from not employing 4 pods on each speaker, but the SA stand has two outrigger "legs" in front (each with it’s own spike), with a fitting in the rear for a third spike. My speaker’s lateral center of mass is centered on the stand’s depth, and I figured if I got the rear Pod with twice the weight capacity of the two front Pods, the speaker/stand/Pod assemble would balance perfectly. John congratulated me on my figerin’ ;-), and humoured me by sending the Pods as I requested. My figuring was correct, the trio works perfectly!

John requires the Pods be ordered in sets of 4, and for use on components having moving parts (turntables, CD spinners, etc.) 4 is definitely the way to go (I tried 3, and that failed spectacularly; both the VPI Aries and Esoteric SACD player flopped around like a fish out of water!). On the other hand, my Townshend Rock Elite table---only about half the mass of the VPI and Esoteric, and sitting on it’s own low mass-platform (who remembers Torlyte?!)---works fine with 3 Pods.

For pieces with no moving parts (and of lower mass), 3 can work just as well, and will cost you less. For instance: my Music Reference tube power amp has all the transformers on one side of it’s side-to-side width, the tube sockets on the other. If fitted with 4 Pods, the Pods on the transformer side would have to be higher weight rated than the 2 on the tube side. Using 3 identical Pods, the amp balances perfectly. And using 3 Pods you can move them around until you achieve balance; I did that with my Herron phono stage and EAR-Yoshino line stage.

Since the Pods are sold in sets of 4 (but the weight capacity can be varied in each set)---3 sets therefore containing 12 Pods, you can use 12 Pods in 3 sets of 4, or 4 sets of 3. Figure out your weight needs, and contact John. You’ll be glad you did!

georgehoffman60-

Following MC I replaced my Gaia’s with the podiums and I was very surprised at the improvement. IMHO they work very very well with Full Range speakers and ribbon cables (In my case the wonderful silversmith Fideliums). Hard to imagine a more “live” sound. PRAT is amazing. Like others I thought I had vibration solved until these. Thanks MC 

You're welcome. My pleasure. It really is hard to believe the effect these things have- until you hear it!

xenolith- Lotta nice folks in the boutique audio world, but I certainly view John and Max and Sue Townshend to be among the nicest. 

That has been my experience as well. Including combining one Pod with Nobsound. Played around with a lot of different combinations. One BDR Cone with 2 Nobsound springs, 1 Pod 2 Nob, 3 Pods 1 Nob, etc. Not so much to find out, but more like you did, now what can I do with this leftover Pod? lol!  

That kind of thing is how I got the idea to put them under my crossover. One of my better improv moves, for sure. Learned by playing around with them like you just did. 

Turntables are all different. Mine because of the rim drive motor works best with Pods under the BDR Source Shelf. https://systems.audiogon.com/systems/8367 Yours may work best on a Podium, or Platform, or Pods. So much depends on details. Now with a lot of experience I am pretty good at figuring this out for myself. Even now though I run it all past John. Now you know why. He's the best! 

Well I certainly have a "Townshend Audio Comes Through" story.

Ordered a set of Size 2 Seismic Bars with D Load Cells. It did take over 2 weeks before they shipped which was kind of a bummer, but these things happen. When they arrived, the first speaker (B&W Matrix 801 Series 2 with North Creek crossovers and 22lbs. of bass bin loading, about 150 lbs. all told) sat perfectly level with all the load cells at about half compression, perfect! Happily, the bars at maximum shortening are the perfect length for the big B&Ws. The second set didn't go so well. Long story short, one of the load cells, although labeled 'D' was in fact a C Load Cell. It got completely squished under the speaker.

So I called and left a message for John at Townshend Audio. He called back right away. He indicated that such a mistake was “extremely rare”, which, as I’m like the Grand Pooba of the FHS (Fallible Human Society), I had compassion for and believe to be true. John indicated that a replacement D Load Cell would be sent out, and sure enough, the next day I received notice that the shipment was on it’s way. He also indicated that he’d give me a discount on a future purchase which I thought was cool. Once installed, the replacement load cell made the second set of bars work perfectly, just like the first.

So, now I had a lone C Load Cell. What to do. Use it somehow. Our preamp is a 2006 Dodd Audio Battery Powered Preamp. It’s got 4 x 5Ah SLA batteries at the back of the preamp which makes the back of the preamp weigh about 25 lbs. The front of the preamp contains mostly air, along with 2 x 6N23P tubes, a couple of bypassed 2.2mF caps, some wire and 3 knobs, weighing about 5 lbs. So a really uneven weight distribution. Anyhoo, I placed the ‘C’ Load Cell under the middle of the back of the preamp and then a Nobsound spring footer (with only 4 springs/footer) under each front corner and the preamp was dead level. Sounded cleaner too. I emailed John asking him what he could sell me 2 x AA Load Cells and a Pod Cap for the lone C cell.  He wrote back that he would send them free of charge. Wow! That was unexpected and awesome!

The end of the story is that they arrived yesterday and the preamp is dead level under the 1 x C Load Cell at the center back and the 2 x AA Load Cells at each front corner. And yes, the sound is noticeably cleaner yet again! Nobsound footers are now under the turntable though destined to be replaced by something Townshend Audio…

Lotta nice folks in the boutique audio world, but I certainly view John and Max and Sue Townshend to be among the nicest.

Following MC I replaced my Gaia’s with the podiums and I was very surprised at the improvement. IMHO they work very very well with Full Range speakers and ribbon cables (In my case the wonderful silversmith Fideliums). Hard to imagine a more “live” sound. PRAT is amazing. Like others I thought I had vibration solved until these. Thanks MC

Following MC I replaced my Gaia’s with the podiums and I was very surprised at the improvement. IMHO they work very very well with Full Range speakers and ribbon cables (In my case the wonderful silversmith Fideliums). Hard to imagine a more “live” sound. PRAT is amazing. Like others I thought I had vibration solved until these. Thanks MC

Those are BDR Round Things. I have a lot of BDR from back in the 90's when it was pretty much the best thing around. So for years they were under everything. Pods and Podiums are a lot better, hugely better. But they can be used together. In my case since I already have them it cost me nothing. But if I didn't already have them no way would I buy, and that is why I don't even hardly mention them any more. It is such a chore moving the speakers around I haven't even tried to compare, just use em as much out of habit as anything, to be honest.   

The Round Things under the Podiums, different story. Those I did try both ways and they do make an improvement. Not enough to be worth buying though. If you use them on carpet I would just look for some nice looking furniture gliders, anything that will slide on carpet as that will make small adjustments a lot easier. 

Hello Mr. Miller Carbon:

I am going to bother you with one more question. Looking at your pictures, what are those discs between your speakers and the podiums and do you feel they are necessary?

Thanks again for all your help.
Sam$

Good Ale We Seek!  https://youtu.be/4YxXQd3y6ow?t=61

Thanks so much for your feedback. My current speakers are on outriggers with cones sitting on Isoclean Tiptoes.  I don’t feel any vibration from my wood floors, so maybe that’s why I blame the room. Probably a combination of both. i just might order the podiums as I am sure they cannot make things worse. I have pissed more money away than that drinking beer,

I have a difficult room with different ceiling heights and much glass. As a result I get an over abundance of the bass range in the 20 hz to 120 hz range. Do you think the podiums would help tame this down?

I’ll be surprised if they don’t. See my comments elsewhere, I was definitely surprised to find a lot of what I assumed was room acoustics went away once the speakers were on Podiums.

What I think happens is, a lot of what we think of as room acoustic problems is really speaker vibrations going directly into the floor, where it travels through to walls and ceiling. So the whole room is being excited and vibrating directly by the speaker. This is in addition to acoustic energy.

Put speakers on Podiums and all this mechanical vibration energy goes away leaving only the room acoustics to deal with. The difference is huge! My room had a good amount of undamped bass boominess that went away once the speakers were on Podiums.

It is the Townshend damping engineering that accounts for this. The reason I am sure of this is mine were on ordinary undamped springs before they were on Podiums. On springs I got a lot of improvement in clarity and detail, with a nice reduction in grain and glare. The sound became a lot less fatiguing, just with plain springs. But the bass boom was pretty much unaffected.

When they went on Podiums everything got even better, plus there was a huge improvement in tone or truth of timbre. It is pretty obvious this is due to eliminating a lot of resonance that colors instrumental textures. Bass sounds a lot more clean and clear, even more articulate than it was- and with a DBA it was pretty darn articulate to begin with!

I should note that so far only the Moabs are on Podiums. My subs are still on ordinary springs. So just the Podiums alone was enough to make a big improvement in reducing boominess in my room. Working on getting the subs on Pods- but I have 5 subs, that is a lot of Pods!

Based on what I have seen together with what people have told me I would think a lot of your problem is vibrations going from the speakers through the floor into walls where it gets the glass vibrating, and the glass is not stiff like sheetrock it is almost like a driver or drum the way it moves. If that is indeed where a lot of your problem is coming from then isolating speakers from floor might be an even bigger improvement in your room than mine, and it was significant in mine.

Thanks Bob

@samgar,
The Podiums will help with isolating vibrations in equipment, but room deficiencies are another matter. The Podiums might help, but you really need to address the glass, as well as the other issues, separately,
IMHO.
Bob

Hello Millercarbon:

Thank you so much for your input. You do have an impressive looking stereo system. One more question. I have a difficult room with different ceiling heights and much glass. As a result I get an over abundance of the bass range in the 20 hz to 120 hz range. Do you think the podiums would help tame this down?
Thanks,
Sam

The Podium feet are a sort of hard rubber. It can slide on hardwood but not easily, not unless your speaker is very light.  

The thing about them is each corner is a spring that must be free to move in all directions. Because of this they don't slide around like anything normal you would be familiar with. It is best to put them right where you want them to be, and then put the speaker on them. The included instructions are clear on how to set them up and get them perfectly level. 

Your speakers aren't attached, they sit on the Podium. Same as they would sit on the floor. No difference. The springy rocking only happens when you tap them. In normal use even playing music quite loud the speakers do not move at all. So no reason for them to be attached. 

Mine are on BDR Cones with Round Things, exact same as what I was doing before. Only now the whole thing is on Podiums. You can see how it looks here https://systems.audiogon.com/systems/8367  

You can also use furniture gliders or other similar stuff under the Podium feet. Mine are on BDR Round Things, and there are others using different sorts of gliders there. They are pretty flexible in terms of it depends what you like and what kind of floor you have. 

One of the best parts is once you get them on there it is super easy to get them precisely level. Before using Podiums I had to use shims and even then it was hard to get perfectly level. With Podiums the knob at each corner turns silky smooth and getting them level is easy and fast. Best of all once you do get them perfectly set up and level they stay put!

Thanks for your comments. Sorry if I picked the wrong John. I will ask you a question since you are so happy with the Podiums. Once the speaker is sitting on them, can it be slid on a wood floor or to do they have a grip which stops them from being able to slide. Also how do they attach to you speakers? Can they screwed to the bottom or just float on the podium?

Thanks,
Sam

Thanks for your comments. Sorry if I picked the wrong John. I will ask you a question since you are so happy with the Podiums. Once the speaker is sitting on them, can it be slid on a wood floor or to do they have a grip which stops them from being able to slide. Also how do they attach to you speakers? Can they screwed to the bottom or just float on the podium?

Thanks,
Sam

I had the same experience this week. John Townshend sincerely apologized and offered helpful assistance. We had a nice back and forth and they're obviously good people who also make very good products.

samgar2,
Podiums are impressive. At the time when I did my review I had tried them based on how well ordinary springs work, and also from having used Pods under my turntable, amp, and phono stage. Podiums are pretty expensive and I wasn’t aware of hardly anyone using them. Pods use basically the same technology so this was a good way of checking them out before stepping up to Podiums.

Then on the review several people posted their experience, which were all like mine, excellent. Some had already done so before but it is hard sometimes to search around and put it all together. We wound up with a pretty wide range of speakers, both in size and cost, all of us real happy and hearing pretty much the same improvements. The main one for me being a freedom from tonal coloration that makes every instrument sound so much more distinct by revealing its natural harmonic structure or timbre. Pods have the same effect but Podiums even more so.

If you are considering them you might want to check it out. https://forum.audiogon.com/discussions/townshend-audio-podiums-the-full-review  
If you decide to get them I highly recommend you contact John Hannant at Townshend. John Hannant is who I think you meant by John Townshend. I gave him the dimensions and weight of my Moabs and he got me the perfect size Podiums.

I was the one who posted in regard to Townshend's poor customer service as they have never answered my questions. Come to find out there was a glitch in their system and once John Townshend found out about the issue, he contacted me numerous times and answered all my technical questions. Based on this, I feel they are first class and would most certainly buy one of their products. I am considering buying the Seismic Podiums.

"Technically no, the first one was about Townsend not Townshend. Still, coulda been worse https://youtu.be/oCLtaK7KLEM?t=123"



Thought I had seen every Python skit but apparently I missed The Dirty Fork. Hilarious and a great summary of this situation. Well done.
 Report t

My mistake. I proof read the body but not the heading. It should have stated Townshend comes through. Auto correct strikes again!

Technically no, the first one was about Townsend not Townshend. Still, coulda been worse https://youtu.be/oCLtaK7KLEM?t=123