I can understand that being a problem if your floor is not solid like concrete. Thanks for sharing, I'd like to see some opinions or suggestions from others.
Townshend Pods under TT Don’t Do
Greetings,
well with all the talk about how great the Townshend Pods are I decided to try a set of Pods under my TT. I found out the hard way, Don’t do this. I have a good TT on a good rack and it sounds very good. With the Pods I had to sneak up on my TT to change the VTA or to que it up. It would start shaking with the lightest of touch. I bought the correct Pods for the weight of my TT. The Pods didn’t harm the sound but didn’t improve the sound either. I will use the Pods under one of my pre amps for now. I can maybe say they might work under equipment but don’t suggest you use them under a TT.
‘I was very disappointed in the results. Maybe your results will be different.
‘Respectfully
Joe
well with all the talk about how great the Townshend Pods are I decided to try a set of Pods under my TT. I found out the hard way, Don’t do this. I have a good TT on a good rack and it sounds very good. With the Pods I had to sneak up on my TT to change the VTA or to que it up. It would start shaking with the lightest of touch. I bought the correct Pods for the weight of my TT. The Pods didn’t harm the sound but didn’t improve the sound either. I will use the Pods under one of my pre amps for now. I can maybe say they might work under equipment but don’t suggest you use them under a TT.
‘I was very disappointed in the results. Maybe your results will be different.
‘Respectfully
Joe
33 responses Add your response
I always felt if you wanted a Turntable with suspension... Buy a properly suspended one from the get go. Hanging vertically from the springs not floating around in all directions. Nothing wrong with springs...they just usually work much better as a first thought included in the design and reasoning of the Turntable and the end users needs. Not an after thought from an over looked end users needs. My Orbe SE is one of a few good examples of better use of springs. Many a non suspended table properly built AND placed with no need for springs under them either. I’ve tried them out of curiosity on other non suspended tables I own. An inexpensive sandbox for far less dollars gives better results Imho... YM (or bias ) MV |
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I have three TT, SOTA Sapphire with engineered in suspended from springs subchassis. Brinkmann Bardo on an HRS ( Harmonic Resolution Systems ) base that includes many technologies including springs.. And even a vintage B and O TX with internal springs lauded by Lederman of Soundsmith fame… Enjoy the journey and the music ! Jim |
My main table is a non suspension type, ClearAudio Master Solution. I really like having a non suspension TT. My second TT does have a suspension, Oracle Delphi. I have had the Delphi for 30 years plus. I’m very accustom to TT with springs. The CA turntable is the first TT I have owned without a suspension. I’m 72 years young and I’m very good at setting up any TT. I really like my CA table and it was my mistake to put springs under it. Joe |
The ClearAudio Master Solution uses three sharp spikes for the turntable with a separate motor pod. This is similar to my old Teres and my current Origin Live Sovereign, both of which are similar no-suspension designs and both of which have been used with Pods with excellent results. They were of course used under a shelf and not directly under the table. The Clearaudio is 24kg, roughly 50 lbs. What shelf were you using it on? How heavy is the shelf? And how many Pods and what color/load? The Teres turntable was also used on Nobsound springs for quite some time before upgrading to Pods. Never with any of these were they the least bit touchy. The only other person I know to have had a problem is willgolf, and his was due to a mixup between pounds and kilograms. Once they got that right everything was fine. Really curious to try and understand what is going on here. |
I’ve seen what you’re talking about but the issue was the wrong springs and they weren’t loaded correctly. If you’re touching the table and it shakes you have a dampening issue. There is no shock absorber or accumulator. A spring will bounce, that is what they do. The correct pod and being adjusted correctly, won’t. (I should say shouldn’t) something is wrong. After building as many heavy plinths for TT as I’ve built you got a GUMMY PUFFER issue..:-) (Spring dampeners). Thorens will wobble all over when they go bad.. Gummy Puffers.. The 30 to 200 lb plinths I build for Thoren, Russco, Garrard, Sparta, Fairchild, EMT, Roberts. Transcription and Broadcast TTs. Have springs and not the least bit touchy.. I may anchor the TT to the plinth but the plinth gets springs and dampeners or the mechanical noise would go through the roof. It’s just TT 101.. Air or a mag lift platter is a step up for vertical isolation, but you still have a horizonal issue because the bushing and spindle still touch.. A standard 3.5" concrete slab is like a trampoline.. You really want dampening and decoupling there if it’s on a soil bed.. A couple million pound Rock face would be a good starting place if you want solid.. There is no such thing as solid.. A life time of anchoring STUFF.. It just moves.. Regards |
Used a Teakwood shelf, 1.5” thick, 23”x17”, butcher block style, approx weight 14 lbs., it looked beautiful. I used 4 pods. C size springs. Total weight est. 66 to 70 lbs. Townshend agreed with the C size springs. I moved the Pods around to get the best balance. I listened to music for 7 days with the pods. I gave it time to settle in. Balance was perfectly set. The TT sounded fine with the Pods. It just didn’t like to be touched ever so softly. I didn’t bang into it or try to make it jump. I know better than banging on a TT. I’m using a Graham Phantom Elite tone arm , 9”. Had arm for the last 6 months. Bought new in 2021, Cartridge is a Benz LPS. TT is set up to the max. I take great pride in setting up TT’s. My Oracle Delphi with a ET2 arm used to be hard to set up perfectly. Learned a lot from that TT. As I said earlier, I’ll used the Pods under my phono amp very soon, it weighs 50 lbs. I did buy some Nobsound springs first but I thought my TT deserved better and that’s why I purchased the Townshend ‘Respectfully Joe |
My slate plinth (60-70 pounds) is on 3 Nobsound springs with the springs compressed to about 60% with left, right, rear—5,3,7 springs in each cup. It sounds a lot better than when it was on cones. Concrete floor with no issues. I’ve had to be careful not to knock the table or lean on it when cueing. Got used to it now with no problems. |
Concrete ain’t what it used to be. The building where B2 wings were assembled was adjacent to a Tidal influenced brackish river… Slabs under the major jigs 3’ thick. Had to be careful to check the tide chart before drilling the front spar…. Of course, we were not using tape measures…Leica laser trackers for the Luddites. Big stuff moves… Thats why for small stuff Minus K exists, HRS, Symposium Sounds like Symposium rack is doing it’s job. |
Tomic601 I didn’t know Brooks Brendan. Not sure if I read about him and his mods.. my Oracle is basically untouched. I rebuilt the Oracle every couple years. I don’t have the dexterity that I used to have so it takes me longer. Last rebuild took me about 8 hours. Now the Oracle with the ET2 is fully functional and totally balanced. Can be a pain to setup, there are 6 different points that must be leveled. And yes I really like the symposium rack, 4 shelves. And not a bad price in today’s world. Looks good also. system sounds good so I’m happy. joe |
I have a plinth coming back from the finishers next week, with the TT mounted will be 150-160lbs, and I’ve got some pods waiting to install as footers. I have a suspended wood floor, will see how it goes. Def too heavy for a floating shelf, def trying to avoid footfalls, and def not really trying to spend the price of a Minus K. |
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If you look at how the Minus K works, the chassis of the device itself is quite massive (I have the big bench top version). There are these vertical upside down pendulums that are holding the inner suspension in place but allow it to sway and the spring pushes the suspension plate from the bottom. It’s a pretty ingenious design, but is costly and has its detractors who prefer other methods. I guess my point is that it is not simply a set of springs. A used Vibraplane is always a sort of cheap possibility (a fresh air compressor from Silentaire will set you back under 1k US new, maybe even less if refurbished with warranty). My biggest concern (which @Syntax said was a non-issue) was that the Vibraplane would require me to constantly readjust my Airline linear arm when the platform rebalanced itself on the automatic/compressor models. There are, I believe, models that allow you to manually pump the air bladders as well. After some discussion, I found that the Herzan wasn’t really meant to address footfalls and required a pretty solid foundation to start. Barry Diament (sp?) was a big advocate of the bicycle tire inner tube in a homemade plinth approach-- never tried it. |
Yeah well I figured I'd try it and fail. When planning the plinth I didn't have the footfalls, then had to move house and now I do. I can definitely attest to DJ turntables "waterbed" floating in properly built NYC clubs and that really helping with vibration control. Maybe the heavy mass will be enough anyway, I've no shortage of that. |
Max Townshend's original Seismic product (the Seismic Sink) was an inner tube (or two, or three, depending on load rating) between two metal plates. For years I used them, only replacing most of them when Max introduced the Seismic Pod. I had tried the Mod Squad Tiptoe in the 80's, and was amused that there were people who considered it (and it's imitations) an isolation device, rather than a coupler, which it of course is. As are spikes. The first time I heard of the idea of inner tube isolation was in the Frank Van Alstine newsletter, published in the mid-80's on. He suggested the inner tube be placed between two cement paving stones, or their equivalent. The Seismic Sink used damped steel plates, the top plate folded over to hide the inner tube. Bright Star made a similar product, using painted MDF in place of the Sink's steel. A single inner tube doesn't take into consideration the mass distribution of a component (for instance the transformer side of a power amp), so can be somewhat unstable. The Seismic Pod may be used in combinations of different load ratings, to balance an uneven mass load. Very flexible. |
The biggest inner tube I ever used, the outside diameter was about 5 feet. Four or five of us laid on it and went down the Paradise Run at Mt Rainier like some kind of hovercraft. All of us beautifully isolated from the violently undulating snow berms down to but a few hertz. Yes the fundamental frequency was that low. And you wouldn’t think it, but in this case I am happy to report, with plenty of amplitude! |
@joenies, I am glad that you experimented and tested springs under your non suspended turntable because now I don’t have to. I also have a heavy mass turntable (Transrotor Apollon 80MM TMD, roughly 130 pounds with three external motors) resting on a nearly 300 pound Clearaudio MontBlanc turntable stand (columns filled with concrete), on a concrete basement floor with stranded bamboo. I would like to know what issues you are trying to resolve or if this was a matter of experimentation? I can knock on the turntable stand and I don’t have any resonant sound getting picked up on the tonearm (who does that when listening to music anyway?), and I am also not getting feedback from excessive loudness from music and bass. It’s not happening, dead silent, so I don’t even think about adding suspension or suspending the turntable because I am completely satisfied with the performance based on the aggregate of the design parameters of the entire system. That is what is key here, synergy of the entire turntable system. Herr Reike from Transrotor has designed some really nice turntables over the years and acoustic feedback elimination is part of that recipe going into the design and build of many Transrotor turntables. Here is a nice video explaining the build details of Transrotor. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L38cZ0Bj-Ys That is why I never bothered to concern myself with the idea of adding a suspension system under my turntable which is built under the principal of being unsuspended. A few of my Deutsche audio friends scoff at the idea of adding complexity to an already rigid system combined with mass loaded racks etc, which help to ameliorate many floor and vibration issues. They rationalize that the precision of the design and noise reduction of the combined materials make for a very quiet platform to start with. I guess at the end of the day, tomato or tomatoe, whichever solution works best for each individuals system is best for them, but not best for all. Thanks for the feedback on your attempt of using a suspension system under your mass loaded turntable. It is good for some, not so for others. |
I had no issues with my TT. After reading many articles and post about how great the springs are, I thought I would try them. my TT sounded very good to my ears, just wanted it to maybe sound better. That plan didn’t work out for me. My TT is back on the rack and sounding good again and the plus is I don’t have to sneak up on it to make changes. @audioquest4life very nice analog setup you have. |
@joenies, Thank you for the compliment. The Clearaudio Master Solution is also a nice rig for listening to vinyl records. It seems that in this hobby, many of us tend to experiment a lot and test things, products, settings to see if we can gain better performance...or perceived better performance. Sometimes changes are different, but not necessarily better, just different sounding to our ears. That is why this hobby is so fun. We can experiment with our systems and come to a rational conclusion based on our own independent listening tests. Glad to hear that your turntable is back on the rack and sounding as it was before. Sometimes, when we attempt to make changes, don't like the change, we may strive harder to get back to our original sound before we messed with anything. Cheers, Ciao, und Freundliche Grüsse, Audioquest4life |