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New SBL foam grills – Do you prefer listening with or without?

Manket

Manket

Forever a Naim Man
Just received a set from itsmarkie today and they look perfectly made and delivered less than 4 days.
Markie was recommended to me by Witch Hat Audio.

I purchased them primarily because of the risk of “little” fingers poking into the naked speakers especially the tweeters! I must say since purchasing my SBL this year I have been enjoying the music without grills.

Hoping to see what affects when I get back to my Swiss home after Lockdown 2.

IMO probably reduces the brightness of the sounds.

In anticipation, do you guys prefer with the grills on or off?
 
Can you bear to listen to the ugly buggers with the grilles off?

The only sight worse than the front view of naked sbls is surely the rear view!
 
I've never owned SBLs but Kans, Saras and Isobariks are similarly voiced and I've always preferred them with the grilles on. You lose a little detail but the music is more coherent and flows better.
 
Where did you buy these grilles? I could do with new grilles for my Briks. The reproduction ones I bought from Korea years ago are turning to dust.
 
To my eyes they beautiful speakers to look at without the grills. Industrial tech I like! However, when I did briefly put the terribly crumbling grills that came with it, they did look rather all dark with black ash. My wife didn’t like look but loved the music it makes!
 
Mr Pig said:
Where did you buy these grilles? I could do with new grilles for my Briks. The reproduction ones I bought from Korea years ago are turning to dust.
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For Briks, we got our most recent grilles from Wilmsloiw Audio. They're not foam but "cloth on frame", so they are "flat" rather than sculpted... but they look OK, and they don't crumble into dust like our three previous sets :D
 
Manket said:
Got mine from markie and he does Linn as well.
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I've seen those grilles before but they don't look very accurate. They look like they're assembled out of several layers of thin foam rather than cut from one piece of thick foam.

I wouldn't buy cloth on frame grilles as they're really easy and cheap to make. Years ago I actually bought the wood and cloth to make cloth grilles for my Briks and I still have it! I much prefer the period look of the foam grilles.
 
Mr Pig said:
I've seen those grilles before but they don't look very accurate. They look like they're assembled out of several layers of thin foam rather than cut from one piece of thick foam.
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Only Tom Tom Audio can provide one piece foams as far as I know and they are £££ something like £175 IIRC.

Markie's are indeed two pieces stuck together. They are much better in the flesh than perhaps they look in photos you have seen. You have to get very close and inspect carefully to see the join at all on my set. Not invisible but damn near. Very reasonable price and a great guy to deal with, what more could you want?
 
nobeone said:
Only Tom Tom Audio can provide one piece foams as far as I know and they are £££ something like £175 IIRC.
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I don't consider that unreasonable for the four Isobarik grilles. I paid about that for my set from Korea.

However, I assumed that they had changed the formulation of the foam in the intervening years, now that the world was aware of the disintegration problem, and the new grilles would last longer. Nope. Same old shite!

Would I still buy them? Probably. They just don't look right any other way.
 
Mr Pig said:
I don't consider that unreasonable for the four Isobarik grilles. I paid about that for my set from Korea.

However, I assumed that they had changed the formulation of the foam in the intervening years, now that the world was aware of the disintegration problem, and the new grilles would last longer. Nope. Same old shite!

Would I still buy them? Probably. They just don't look right any other way.
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Apologies, talking at sight cross purposes, I'm talking SBL foams, only now do I realise you are talking Briks, I consider £175 for some SBL foams daft when Markie's are very nice for less than 1/3 ...
 
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