Childproof system

I’m sure there are people with children here, just curious what others do to childproof things?

I recently started using the foam plugs despite having my speakers away from the wall. AFAICT no blocks or other toys have disappeared yet, but I can’t be sure. I guess if I can’t hear it it doesn’t matter that much. The foam plugs have to be re-seated regularly, which is evidence they’re needed.

I’ve also using the optional bases with my speakers (B&W 702s2) and I probably should consider lowering the max volume setting on the Star.

The domes on my B&Ws got pushed in by inquisitive fingers many years ago. Astonishingly, it seemed to make no difference to the sound. They were the basic aluminium tweeters from several years ago, not the diamond ones, so it could have been much worse. I might have just been lucky, but I found my children were fairly good around the system.

As for childproofing, I suppose a strap holding the speakers to the wall is out of the question. A mate with a CD5X uses a heavy buckled nylon strap around the player to hold the drawer closed.

Mark

Grilles on, and never any problem when my kids were kids. (Grille covered the port as well as drivers.) too heavy for any risk of pushing over.

With first child TT was under a Perspex lid that was part of the unit, not easy for child access. After moving house that went, so with 2nd child I had TT on a rack, rack inside a cupboard, with childproof catches on tge doors (learning from someone else i knew who lost a cartridge to inquisitive fingers).

VCR player slot, however, was a repository for Lego and other small things…

As a side note, I was amazed at how little difference they make. I was expecting a much larger effect.

When mine was a baby there was no protection in place. He was monitored; given stern looks and removed when necessary. When he was able to talk then we talked. Never been an issue. Had mire problems with my mother insisting that a glass of wine was perfectly okay atop a CDX2.

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I had a pair of Royds suffer the same fate at the hands of an inquisitive visitor, and they, too, still work with inverted tweeter domes. Still, grilles on has to be the answer.
In general, I strongly believe that having a relaxed and inclusive attitude to young kids and music is the best approach. If they understand what the gear is for, and are encouraged to use and enjoy it, they are far less likely to abuse it.
I’ve seen posts before by people suggesting that draconian measures and threats should be used to keep kids away from the HiFi, and it just makes me think Jeez, I’m glad you’re not my dad!

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Member @MMky has some photos of his system with some baby gates in front of the Fraim.

Many kids see this only as an extra challenge, not as an definite obstruction.

We once had gates at the staircase, this was requested by the babysitter back in the days. It was before he turned one when he was able to climb over it. (the babysitter also left a window open on floor 2 and my kid was rescued by the neighbour from the roof - security is not always as safe as you think since a kid might consider different challenges like climbing out of a window).

After that, no baby gates, baby stall or even a baby monitor has entered the house.

Had the B&W tweeters replaced twice. Replaced the B&W’s by SBLs and bought custom made steel grills for these.

@OP, the bungs make a bit, but not too much difference on B&W’s. Maybe its time to leave B&W and look for some loudspeakers which go against or close to the wall.

And interestingly, despite both parents and their parenting attitudes and skills being the same, children are individuals and have different characters, and where one can be very easy to manage, learning and complying as desired, another can be the complete opposite, always doing the opposite of whatever one tries to teach them to do - which at the toddler stage can mean that where one child doesn’t touch the hifi, to another every opportunity, however brief, is taken to find out what happens if they do this…

And when something very expensive and fragile is concerned - e.g. a moving coil cartridge on a delicate arm, or speaker cones, there is a lot of sense in seeking to protect in one way or another before discovering that your lovely young child has inquisitive tendencies you thought were trained otherwise… so unless you really are capable of and will ensure 100% direct supervision (and if it’s consequences are desirable for the child), then making somehow making fragile valuable things inaccessible is sensible - but playing music, both for your own enjoyment and for the child’s learning should continue very much as normal.

I suppose as long as the tweeter is vibrating at the right frequency, its shape is relatively immaterial. The decay modes and other fun esoterica would change but most of the basic requirements of a tweeter wouldn’t change.

B&W’s latest iteration of the 600 series have very solid-looking tweeter grilles which would have been very helpful to me 15 years ago when they made them without any protection at all. Ah well.

I’m not comfortable with threatening children either. I was occasionally on the receiving end of that sort of thing when I was growing up and didn’t find it conducive to a positive relationship. I’d rather have poked-in tweeters and a positive relationship with my children than the inverse.

Mark

Our daughter has been fine around our systems and enjoys them as much as we do.

The only issue I have had is with one of her cousins who pushed the speaker domes in a few times when no-one was looking. To my shame, I blamed my daughter the first time until I realised it was happening when “the rat” was visiting. Anyway, easily fixed by sucking out with a vacuuming cleaner and toilet roll insert.

I would certainly set the maximum volume outputs where you can.

A suitable diameter cardboard or plastic tube - on a friend’s tweeters I found 19mm pvc overflow pipe perfect, and sucking by mouth quite adequate. I’d be wary of a vacuum cleaner, especially a powerful one.

That works on plastic fines - aluminium may be another matter, especially if it has creased.

Most obvious effect of an inverted or partially inverted done is likely to be the off-axis dispersion, which might affect the soundstage to some extent as well as the sound of listening well off axis. However depending on the design of the tweeters pushed-in domes could end up touching the magnet pole-piece, causing audible artifices or distortion.

I found effective contraception was the best childproofing for my system.

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ATC HTS wall mount series are a great solution. I just got the 7s for that very reason. Don’t need to worry about them getting tipped over or pushed in and they sound great.

Safety comes first - that of the children that is.

Speakers - yeah - always have grilles on. Otherwise asking for trouble.

And never have stand mounts - too much risk - of damage to speakers - or worse, speakers falling on a child - specially with two boisterous kids.

Kids are different. While my older one never cared to touch Naim gear - he loved the silver button on Rega gear. So I was forced to get rid of my Rega stuff. The younger one - well - he wants to get the ball bearings out from below the glass on the Fraim - so I had to get rid of the ball bearings for several months. He’s lost interest now, so the Fraim is back how it should be.

While I trusted the older one even with my TT - taking no such chances with the younger one. Knowing him, he’ll yank the tone arm right off just to tease me. He used to love turning the Nac72 preamp off - and loved the fact that I told him not do so. Go figure.

N-Sats are pretty much child-proof in this respect, if you use the dedicated stands or wall brackets. You have to lift then vertically upwards for an inch or so before they become free from the stands, so they can’t just be pushed off.

If I had regular standmounts, I would just put holes in the stands, and screw them up into the base of the speakers. This would be pretty much invisible on many stands.

I made the mistake of having standmounters (shl5+) on stands that were on slippery tiles. I just didn’t know that they were slippery - and this was in a room that the kids usually never got into.
As luck would have it - a slight nudge meant that one foot of the stand got off the tile - and the whole thing toppled over - and worse it met with a Rega rack on the way down.
The only thing that slowed the disaster down - the speaker cable - which meant slight damage to one of the binding posts.
Anyway - the mistake was all mine - speaker should not have been on tiles - and I was lucky that no one got hurt.
Hated the speakers anyway - and was still able to sell them off…

We have an easier time with softwood floorboards, which can easily have the spikes buried quite deep to help with stability. With reasonably wide spacing on the base of the stands, that means it would take a pretty hard push to topple them, and I don’t think floorstanders would be significantly more stable, unless they were massive.

When I had a child running around, my system (CDS, 52, 135s and active SBLs) was on Mana stands. There was never a problem (I.e. no damage done) - she liked music, as did her mother. All credit goes to the mother as I was away for most of the time.

I always put my speakers on cupboards when i had young childen . Had my beautiful godson here on sunday but he can only just crawl . my tannoys are fairly high on stands but think i would be putting child proof fencing in front when he gets a big bigger