ThomasOK wrote:It is obvious that Anders has put a lot of time and care into making the most musical supports and this is one of the things I find so attractive about this series of racks.
Yes, it's now 10 years since it was introduced. Since he started working on it before that, he's tried a lot of things over the years.
... Anders states clearly in the FAQ section that no comparisons have been done of these different woods.
I think what he is doing is deliberately staying away from the discussion of which wood sounds best.
Please note that Harmonihyllan Oden can be ordered without shelves. You get all the parts but need to make or order your own shelves. With this option, one could easily compare at least the top shelf of different woods. My guess is that one can then upgrade to Tor by making the thinner lower shelves of the same best sounding wood - and only order the extra metal and dampening parts.
With Mimer the situation is a little different, as the main shelf is of machined aluminium. I am not sure how much the wood qualities of the thinner lower shelf will then affect the performance, as that shelf appears to act mainly as a resonance dampener. But if it does matter, then why not use that optimal sounding wood, from the Oden shelf experiments?
If I was as concerned about the sound quality differences between woods as you are, Thomas, I might have gone down this route. Personally, I'll stick with the wood that Anders uses in his development, because I'll then know everything works as intended. As I mentioned, Anders has had problems with humidity variations and therefore always keeps track of the humidity level when doing experiments. Wool was first used as dampening material, but proved impossible to optimise as it varied strongly. The shelves are also much thinner and larger than an LP12 plinth, which makes them impossible to keep exactly flat in varying enviromental conditions. Wood properties, fastening and dampening can therefore become interrelated variables.