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Fighting vibrations and oscillations can be done in various ways. Pawel concentrated on the properties of treated and untreated metals, ceramics and plastics. All are modern materials which can be combined according to the expression of the whole being greater than the sum of its parts. Where production of his products is concerned, central is a high-precision CNC machine. Next to being able to work with very tight tolerances, unlike hand labor such a machine can repeat the same identical process time after time. This makes for high product consistency. Did you know that anodized aluminum has a surface four times harder than glass? We didn't. Nor did we grasp that whilst the surface is hardened by the anodizing process, the underlying aluminum remains flexible.


We received a sample of Pawel’s Ceramic Disc Classic footers while attending the Warsaw show last year and have used the three footers under various pieces of equipment since. His footers sat under CD players, DACs and various amplifiers. The Ceramic Discs Classic are attractively packed in a metal candy box with foam lining. Each footer consists of no less than 18 separate parts. The base is a beveled aluminum disk of 68mm across which sits on a vibration-absorbing washer. On top protrudes a chrome-nickel threaded bolt that forms the connection to the second section, a machined aluminum cup with a cross section of 59mm and height of 30mm. Like the base this cup is anodized and equipped with a vibration-absorbing washer. In the cup sits a 50mm wide 13mm high ceramic disk with a silicone o-ring to stay centered. On the underside of the ceramic disk are three holes that each house a 6mm ceramic ball. On top of the disk sits a fourth 8mm ceramic ball fixed with an aluminum Star Trek-like placeholder which in turn sits on pieces of vibration-damping material. Finally atop that ball balances an aluminum disk of 50mm diameter with a softish polymer/silicone inlay carrying the Franc Audio Accessories logo. Ceramic disk plus four balls form an effective ball bearing with minimal surface contacts. Yes, eighteen parts in total.


One can use the footer in more than one way. The first is with the bottom disk and cup with topping screwed together. That results in a 46mm tall item. For leveling the load, one or more of the cups of the three footers can be elevated by turning the cup counter-clockwise. Whilst the complete footer with screwed-down cup is rock steady, even a little unscrewing of the cup introduces wobble as though the bolt’s thread was slightly too narrow. We used the footers in their screwed-down immobile position on shelves which were perfectly leveled..


Pawel on these findings: Yes it’s a small drawback of my construction. In the beginning I figured that an M6 thread would be a good option for leveling audio components that aren't too heavy. Yet it turned out that after the anodizing process it’s very difficult to get perfectly consistent dimensions of the threaded aluminum parts. Some unexpected clearance between screw and aluminum thread appears which is very difficult to eliminate but causes instability. Hence I decided to recommend against leveling audio components in this fashion. The anodizing process is one of the special processes needed for this footer to work as designed. If you specify a 30 micrometer deep surface however, you’ll never get it exactly to 30. You'll end up between 28-32 for sure. And this effects the threaded shaft.


A second option to use the Ceramic Disc Classic is to unscrew the bottom section altogether and only use the cup. This reduces the total height by 11mm to 35mm. It is not possible to put equipment straight onto the top ball as that sits recessed in the cup. Locating the best place to put the Ceramic Disc Classic beneath the equipment to be isolated is no 1-2-3 job. Two factors play a role. One is weight distribution. Most hifi gear has a power transformer section on one side which makes it much heavier there. And the original footers could be in the way. Our advice is to remove all stock footers and not compromise where the new footers can go. With the Ceramic Disc Classic take care that the polymer inlay is sticky and adheres nicely which is further assisted by the weight of the gear bearing down.