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Tweakers' Asylum Tweaks for systems, rooms and Do It Yourself (DIY) help. FAQ. |
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In Reply to: BB pellet tweak posted by ginov on January 4, 2025 at 20:44:05:
I thought I'd post a follow up to this thread. Thanks to Kona I found the article and decided to try it myself. I managed to source some zinc-coated BBs on eBay (2 x 4000 pellet containers) and found some suitable plastic craft/bead boxes similar to the boxes used in the original article. I was pleasantly surprised to hear placing the BBs on various components of my system did have a positive benefit. The biggest impact was with my vintage refurbished tube power amp (Leak Stereo 20). Placing BBs on the top of the amp adjacent to the output and input transformers discernibly improved and broadened the soundstage, the sound was also more relaxed and had slightly increased detail. Interestingly, I replaced the lead shot in the container sitting on my CHORD QUTEST with the BBs. I must say, I wasn't expecting too much there but was happy to hear that the BBs provided a benefit over lead shot. Not as large an improvement as the power amp, but they did provide a more relaxed and slightly more detailed sound. Clearly then it's not simply a weight damping or anti resonance effect. As mentioned in the Absolute Sound article they found the benefit was specific to the zinc-coated pellets and suggested a possible effect through absorbing stray magnetic fields/eddy currents from power supplies which can negatively impact circuitry. However the BBs are working, there is a noticeable benefit. Overall, I found it a worthwhile experiment and the BB boxes are staying as part of my system. I will be trying some Sorbothane on the base of the boxes to see if there is any additional benefit through some additional vibration damping.
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Follow Ups
- RE: BB pellet tweak - ginov 02/7/2502:40:13 02/7/25 (1)
- Lead and Sorbothane - Geoffkait 11:05:34 02/8/25 (0)