Audio Engineers ZeroPads Active Available Soon

Audio Engineers' ZeroPads Active isolation feet are designed to provide a stable structure allowing for adaptive damping. Audio devices with adaptive vibration control can outperform passive solutions, says the company.

ZeroPads Active is designed for audio devices, projectors, turntables, centre- and bookshelf speakers and promise an extraordinary acoustic performance with enhanced sound clarity.

Each ZeroPads Active adaptive vibration control system incorporates Audio Engineers' unique design principles to deliver unbelievable results, providing a high degree of adaptive damping.

The “soul” of the ZeroPads Active vibration absorbers is the Active Crystal Ball, which implements adaptive vibration-control based on the principle of piezoelectricity, we are told.

The Science Bit

ZeroPads Active is made of non-magnetic, high-strength stainless steel (HSLA), which is also used in the automotive industry and has exceptionally high damping properties. Inside the metal housing, is an almost perfectly spherical synthetic quartz crystal ball. The reason for choosing synthetic over natural quartz is that the former boasts better piezoelectric efficiency.

The weight of a device placed on the ZeroPads Active is constant, but the different vibrations exert a continuously varying pressure on the crystal balls placed in the vibration absorbers. The specially designed, inverted-cone ball sockets only make contact with the surface of the crystal balls with a thin rim, thus increasing the force of the pressure, while providing axial and radial damping, states Audio Engineers.

The changes in pressure create an electric charge of opposite polarity at the diagonal pressure points of the crystal balls, which excites an electric field. The strength of the electric field varies in proportion to the strength of the pressure. Apparently, the electric field forces the synthetic quartz crystal to change size in the opposite direction to the pressure change so that the Active Crystal Balls eliminate higher frequency vibrations and micro-vibrations adaptively, as the reaction occurs in a fraction of a second.

The manufacturer says that Zero Pads Active vibration control systems can effectively eliminate the higher-frequency and micro resonances over a wide range. Additionally, the high-quality special, closed-cell gel foam elastomer discs prevent the propagation of low and medium-frequency vibrations.

A set of four ZeroPads Active has a guide RRP of £269 and comes with a lifetime warranty.