[Rclark]

 Clear as a bell is right. On the Ncores they are pure magic. Love mine.

[Berndt]

They're small enough to rig up a cat-proof barrier...

Cat proof was the reason I asked John to make a wooden frame in the first place. I liked the look of the perforated metal of the maggie panel and I said to him hey, why don't you make the frame out of wood too.
The rest is magnestand history.

[Davey]

From the Magnestand site: "It can have mitered corners or traditional "square" butted joints. Same cost either way. However I recommend and only do the butt joined corners anymore because the sharp angles of the mitered ones can put the grain in opposition which has shown a tendency of the corners to open up in time as the wood shrinks. (they open in winter when the shrink rate is greatest, and tend to reclose in summer) Butt joints may suffer a slight unevenness at the top at some times in the year but should never get crack openings."

Interesting, considering his previous comments.

Anyways, my butt-jointed frames have been working beautifully for well over three years now.  But what do I know. 

Dave.

[kevin360]

Interesting, considering his previous comments.

Anyways, my butt-jointed frames have been working beautifully for well over three years now.  But what do I know. 

Dave.

I think I know what you mean and I hear you about not having issues. It'll soon be 6 years and neither have any of my spline miters or my mortise and tenon joints opened one tiny bit - not bad for the work of an amateur. I've learned a bit since then and I have some better tools. I keep thinking about having another go at it and trying what I really had in mind, but I'm pretty sure it's still well beyond my skill level. One thing I know - I'll never do anything like that again without drawing up and working from plans (each of my frames is ever so slightly different ).

[Davey]

I like the aesthetics of the mitered corners, but they are a bit trickier for the average weekend warrior to achieve....especially if the angles are not exactly 45 degrees.

Those MG12's of Mr. Orange look sharp!

Cheers,

Dave.

[jmowbray]

I knew Steve would beat me to the punch...

This man has a veritable Magnepan museum - older MMGs, 1.7s upstairs and (in the same room as the MMGs) 20.7s!  So for him to say that the Magnestand MMGs were impressive is truly saying something. 

Except for MMGs, the only other Magnepans I heard previously were MG-12's and 3.6's being Magnestanded (is that a word?) at Mr. Gunn's.  Going into this, I thought that my Magnestand's might sound shouty trying to fill Steve's 50 foot long upstairs room.  They didn't!  They actually sounded really convincing, maybe 90-95% as effective as the 1.7's with only a slightly shorter soundstage. 

MGbert

Marc - my offer still stands (no pun intended) for me to schlep my Gunned 1.6's up to Steve's for a listening session. It would be interesting (for me at least) to see how close they get to the 20.7's (with some subwoofer help). I'm pretty confident they would equal or beat any stock 3.x series Maggie.

FWIW, I have long offered to bring these back to the dealer where I bought the 1.6's initially for a demo - no interest whatsoever. At least Steve seems to be open to a comparison....

Jack

[Randy]

asdf

[Davey]

FWIW, I have long offered to bring these back to the dealer where I bought the 1.6's initially for a demo - no interest whatsoever. At least Steve seems to be open to a comparison....

You understand why dealers would (probably) not be interested, right?  Regardless of the outcome, there's no up-side for them.

Dave.

[Rclark]

Marc - my offer still stands (no pun intended) for me to schlep my Gunned 1.6's up to Steve's for a listening session. It would be interesting (for me at least) to see how close they get to the 20.7's (with some subwoofer help). I'm pretty confident they would equal or beat any stock 3.x series Maggie.

FWIW, I have long offered to bring these back to the dealer where I bought the 1.6's initially for a demo - no interest whatsoever. At least Steve seems to be open to a comparison....

Jack

I was totally going to do the 1.6 and mod it, would have been trivial and cost about the same, but I decided it would be more fun to do the MMG mod and the MMG mod just had way too many raves about its sonic presentation.

I hope your 1.6's make the trip, would make for interesting reading.

[SteveFord]

Sure, you can bring 1.6s by.
I had a beat tube in my preamp downstairs so just ordered a "new" set. 
I thought things were sounding kind of funny, stupid things.

I suspect that you'll find that for a given size room you'll need a larger speaker no matter what. 
When I tried putting the 1.7s downstairs they just sounded way too small in comparison to the 3.7s.
You can also go too big which is what I've been struggling with.  I don't want to go smaller, I want to get the house enlarged which is kind of crazy but that's what I'm going to end up doing. 

[josh358]

Sure, you can bring 1.6s by.
I had a beat tube in my preamp downstairs so just ordered a "new" set. 
I thought things were sounding kind of funny, stupid things.

I suspect that you'll find that for a given size room you'll need a larger speaker no matter what. 
When I tried putting the 1.7s downstairs they just sounded way too small in comparison to the 3.7s.
You can also go too big which is what I've been struggling with.  I don't want to go smaller, I want to get the house enlarged which is kind of crazy but that's what I'm going to end up doing.

What's your problem with big? Too much bass? Because you should be able to tame that with a bit of EQ.

I'm thinking too that HP's little room is apparently great with Maggies, apparently because of what happens to the back wave. While a big room can do more for your sound than just about anything else, there are ways to improve a smaller space.

Not that I'm discouraging you from knocking down walls.

[SteveFord]

I have to double up the seat cushions on the couch to sit higher and push the furniture as far back as possible.
I've got a bum tube in the preamp so I won't be listening to that system for around a week, anyway.
The good news is I can play around with the 1.7s upstairs or wear headphones.
The wife is on the warpath so it's just as well I'm far away from the old sweet heart and the blizzard of dog hair which passes for the family dog.
The even better news is that motorcycle season is just about here so then I can really put some distance between myself and home and hearth.

[jk@home]

Interesting, considering his previous comments.

Anyways, my butt-jointed frames have been working beautifully for well over three years now.  But what do I know. 

Dave.

Yeah, I must of done my frames wrong also (and now that I think about it, was even told so ), cause I have absolutely no expansion or shrinkage with the double sandwich frame construction I copied from you. I do keep the house at around 45% RH all year, imagine that helps.

Dave, have you ever given the thought of adding some sort of dampening material between your panels and wood frames, such as thin sheets of Sorbothane?

I've flirted with the idea of taken the frames apart, re-routing in the space needed and adding some of this stuff on both sides of the panel:

http://www.amazon.com/Isolate-It-Sorbothane-Vibration-Damping/dp/B004LY8UTY

I may just go for some 1.7s later this year, so am holding off. If that doesn't happen, may try this extra frame mod.

[Davey]

Dave, have you ever given the thought of adding some sort of dampening material between your panels and wood frames, such as thin sheets of Sorbothane?

I've flirted with the idea of taken the frames apart, re-routing in the space needed and adding some of this stuff on both sides of the panel:

No, I haven't tried that.  Conceptually, it defeats the purpose (one of the purposes) of the wood frames.  However, some of the fellas have noted improvements from Razoring....which (I think) is a similar tactic.

But what do I know. 

Dave.

[kevin360]

But what do I know. 

Dave, this question is killing me!

[Maritan]

I wanted to Gunn my MMGs, but I decided to wait on it for a while. Glad to see they sound as good as they look.

SteveFord - I didn't realize you rode. What's your motorcycle of choice? I ride (well, rode before the injury) as well and I'm getting annoyed with my knee. As soon as I can safely take the weight of bike on my leg at a light, I'll be putting some serious miles on it!

[SteveFord]

I've had motorcycles since I was sixteen.
It went from Japanese to BSA, Triumph and Norton to BMW and Ducati to Moto Guzzi to Buell.
I currently have 4 Buells, 3 tube frame 1200s and a Ulysses which I've put close to 70,000 miles on. 
They're a lot of fun.

[Maritan]

That's a good list with some elite company. I'm thinking about a BMW to take on a longer road trip. Not anytime soon, but I would love to take a month off from work cruise the country side.

I test rode a Buell once. Can't remember the model. They nearly rattled my teeth out just cruising along at 45mph. My eyesight was blurry. Got back as quickly as I could to the dealer and never looked back. I'm glad it worked out for you though. I've talked to several people that love their Buells. Cool looking this. Ride safe!

[jk@home]

No, I haven't tried that.  Conceptually, it defeats the purpose (one of the purposes) of the wood frames.  However, some of the fellas have noted improvements from Razoring....which (I think) is a similar tactic.

But what do I know. 

Dave.

My thought would be it would complement or replace that purpose of the wood frames, but then I'm no engineer. The wood frame mod is very popular, but as is, cannot be the SATA of frame construction. There's always a better mousetrap to be discovered.

[SteveFord]

It must have been an old tube frame model; I test rode a buddy's Cyclone one cold day in 2002 and couldn't wait to get back on my Guzzi.  I hated it.
I thought about it for a few days and it reminded me of a Norton so I test rode an X1W a few weeks later and the rest is history.
They smooth out around 75 MPH so aren't the best city traffic motorcycles.
They do handle better than anything else I've ever ridden which has proven to be a good thing when I enter a corner going a little too fast.  Uh oh...
So as to not totally derail this thread:
http://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?topic=103786.0

What would the drawbacks be to a carbon fiber frame for the Magnepans (other than cost)?