Speaker stands for Monitor Audio R352's?

[orbscure]

As per the subject line, I'm looking for a nice pair of speaker stands to suit my Monitor Audio R352's... new or second-hand suggestions welcome :)

Cheers
Pete

[istari_knight]

Epos stands are what you need really IMO. Heybrook also sold very similar one's...

http://www.needledoctor.com/Epos-ST-12i-Speaker-Stands-image.gif

[istari_knight]

Sorry, I somehow read "Monitor Audio R852" :doh:

Not sure about the R352.

[orbscure]

Cheers James... funnily enough, I was looking at Epos stands, so hopefully somebody has a suggestion for stands to suit my R352's...

[system7]

You can read about the reflex Monitor Audio R352 and closed box smaller R252 at Stereophile:
http://www.stereophile.com/interviews/567

I have the later R300-MD, which is the R252 with a SEAS metal dome tweeter rather than a (IIRC) Vifa soft dome Tweeter.:
http://www.seas.no/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=75&Itemid=99

This speaker has been my test piece, the ferrofluid in the SEAS tweeter having dried up and turned solid, and I have done lots of things to it. Currently it has a 92mm Monacor HT22/8 cone tweeter which sounds very nice and a 3rd order KEF type crossover. The original could sound a bit harsh at times to my ears, so I gave the bass a bit of RC rolloff and I just like cone tweeters.

The trick is to get them up off the floor IMO. I just use furniture...:)

I could suggest some crossover tweaks if you are interested. 33R 10W wirewound and 0.33uF across the 1.5mH bass coil does good things to start with, to notch the cone breakup around 7kHz.

[The Grand Wazoo]

The stands that MA made for them at the time were none too special, so I wouldn't trouble yourself over finding a pair of those!

[system7]

Ideally a speaker should positioned be at listening height for reasons I will explain later.

Putting a speaker with the bass driver near the floor produces something called "Floor Bounce". This is a 6dB reinforcement of the bass due to reflection from the floorboards. You would call that boomy. It's even worse on the floor in a corner.

A skeletal metal speaker stand works well enough, and I always use rubber feet on the box too. A solid cabinet like my chest of drawers produces a little bass reinforcement, it's like having a bigger baffle, but hardly noticeable.

But the main thing to get right is the listening height. If the designer has done his work on phase right, there is a sweet spot between the bass and treble units and they will sound integrated. Below and above, you get a suckout at crossover as the relative phase and reinforcement of the two units changes. This is just how it works and you can't escape it. The diagram below may help.

I find reflex works well near a back wall, whereas closed box, with it's deeper response works better away from the back wall. 8" units do beam quite a lot at 2-3kHz, but again, that is just how it works. It's a good sounding combo done right.

[orbscure]

:) Appreciate the feedback chaps... it appears that the open/skeleton type stands are between 40-50mm high, which given my planned listening seating position, appears to be just about right. I have to say that my initial listen with the speakers sat on the floor, I don't appear to be getting the bass related floor bounce mentioned. I've also read that some R352 owners have felt the need to put bungs in the bass port, but to my ears, it doesn't appear that the bass being produced with my pair needs reigning in. Perhaps this might change once they are up in the air...

Cheers
Pete

[Beobloke]

The stands that MA made for them at the time were none too special...

Sonically, you're probably right, but I just think that R352s look completely and utterly WRONG sat on anything else, personally!

[orbscure]

Would the MA custom stands be what we can see under the attached example?

http://specialistdivision.files.wordpress.com/2013/02/monitor-audio-ma352.jpg

[system7]

Hardly rocket science anyway! Just we do love to fiddle with our HiFi. :D

A stand that tilts the speaker back can improve phase alignment, though I didn't think that was an issue with this speaker.

FWIW, here's the typical Monitor Audio crossover which they seemed to use on all their models for years after Robin Marshall left. I did a lot of work on this one, the 33R/0.33uF tank I fitted across the bass coil is a REALLY good mod and improves smoothness and phase. The Zobel on the tweeter just rolls off the top end a bit if it sounds overly bright. These are standard 10W and 3W wirewounds and polypropylene capacitors which you can buy at Maplin. You could equally increase the 2.2R resistor to 3.3R I suppose. Very easy to swap tweeters here for almost any typical 88dB unit.