[eruditass]

so has there been any consensus yet? i don't want to damage my IEMs and would rather tear up olives.. infact i did by ripping off the tube and now it wont fit anything.

i am thinking of cutting out the tube with an exacto knife..

 

[EvertonMint]

The easiest way I have found of getting the Shure foam onto the superfi.3's is to push the foam onto a metal barreled pen (like a Parker pen) and heat (the foam) with a hairdryer, push the foam onto the pen barrel as far as is possible, then remove once hot, now quickly push onto the ear piece.

Goes onto really easily, no need for pliers or any of that..

 

[EvertonMint]

btw, by saying foam I mean the entire foam tip as it comes in the packaging without removing the rubber tube inside.

 

[oogabooga]

I've managed to get small olives onto TF10s by stretching out the olives with pliers from one end and inserting the TF10s through the other. Thanks to all for the great advice! Sound isolation is awesome.

When I compared olives to TF10 small silicones, I noticed some treble attenuation, likely due to the large bit of foam sticking out past the end of the TF10 tube getting squished over the "sound hole" in my ears.

Anyone have success "trimming" the olives, ideally from the "back", to fit better? How'd you do it?

Also, do the Comply tips still stick out over the top of the TF10 or are they more flush? Are Comply more like Shure smalls or mediums?

 

[oogabooga]

The treble attenuation was too much. I've adapted tk3's solution for my needs - I used my thumbnails to separate a small Shure olive's foam from its tube (works remarkably well, easy to get perfect removal!). The foam gets quite smushed but regains shape after a minute. Then took my old Shure yellow foamies from E2Cs, stripped the foam off and sanded any remaining yellow foam off with a nail file. Use a pair of pliers to stretch the olive foam, slip the tube inside, and voila! I plan to glue them together after a couple days of testing.

I used direcow's idea of pushing the tube so that it is nearly flush with the top of the olive - this way no excess foam is likely to pinch out the treble.

So far, I've got a good seal, no detectable loss of treble, and wicked bass. Most importantly, I don't yet have the "burning ears" that an apparent allergic reaction to UE silicones gives me! Took about half an hour, all told. I may yet try the Complys, and if I do I'll report back with a comparison.


PS - tk3's suggestion of using the actual UE grey foam's tube is a good (probably better) one, as the Shure yellow foamie tube has an inner "lip" that slightly covers the sound tube. I just wasn't willing to sacrifice my grey foams... yet!

 

[riChchestMat]

One of the problems with this mod is that the shaft of the earphones are quite wide compared to the Shures. I've been using the method where the original core of the black olive is ripped out and the core from a UE grey foam is inserted in it's place. This works for a lot of people because the UE grey foam core is hardy, can be re-used and we all get a set with the earphones.

The problem though is that this makes the shaft even wider and it can poke through the foam and cut against the inner ear. The black olive foam can sometimes slip off the UE core and stick in the ear after removing the phones.

I've got a new solution.

Instead of using a UE grey foam core or stretching the original Shure core over the shaft I'm now using a Comply core. I bought a set of the Comply foam tips but switched to Black Olives as the Comply foam is weak, gets dirty quickly and generally doesn't last very long at all. But the core is thinner and flexible yet wider. It doesn't come off the phone shaft too easily and it has a tighter fit inside the Black Olive foam. Most importantly it doesn't poke the inside of the ear so no more scratching sensation.

Follow the usual process for removing the Shure core from the Black Olive. I use a combination of pulling, pushing and a pin to cut some of the fibres. Remove the comply foam in a similar fashion (which is much quicker and easier).
To get the new core to fit inside the Olive you will need to lightly fold it twice (into quarters). This allows the core to fit inside the hold and when you release the core from its folded state it pops back into the tube shape.
Finally pull the foam back into shape as it will probably be flat at the moment. You will want ot pull it back as far as possible and even pull it back some more once the new foams are on your earphone shaft.

 

[hgw]

What size Olives would equal the Comply T400?

 

[HeadphoneAddict]

Quote:

Originally Posted by hgw /img/forum/go_quote.gif What size Olives would equal the Comply T400?

Medium for external size being similar, but the core is too small to fit on the UE earphones, so you need to modify them.

 

[hgw]

Quote:

Originally Posted by HeadphoneAddict /img/forum/go_quote.gif Medium for external size being similar, but the core is too small to fit on the UE earphones, so you need to modify them.

Thanks, I did mean the external dimension. I will modify them.

 

[Donnyhifi]

actually, what I've found out is that the Shure olives are alright, sound better than stock but makes the soundstage too wide and unreal. It seems like there is sound coming from the left, right and the middle but nothing in between, this I found made it difficult to locate things.

For the last few months I've moved to the E2C Orange Foams. Soundstage is not quite as wide but there is much better distinction in location, it also cleans up the sound quite abit. They don't last as long and are more temperature sensitive but they make the UE SF5Pros sound much better than with any other tips.

The other thing to mention is that they are much easier to put on and are cheaper than the Olives

Shure Orange Foams

 

[tenpaiyomi]

Got some of these working on the ADDIEMs, and they are awesome. My methodology was slightly different (I couldn't find any pliers).

What I did instead was took a knife and went in a circular motion around the bottom inner radius about 3 or 4 times; just enough to really be able to take a screwdriver and push it in as far as possible. The screwdriver has to be big enough to expand the core of the tip slightly. Then, just left it there for ~2 minutes, pulled it off and pushed it on to the ADDIEMs. It's a very snug fit, and I am probably going to have to use a bit of force to twist them off, or just cut it off, but that will be in several months time down the line I am sure. Still well worth it.

 

[eukaryote:)]

I can't see this mod being done so this is one a person on my other forum,
Dr. Zoidberg suggested: Comply for triple's: Invert them i.e. the rubber tube is now sticking out into your ear rather than being inserted first into the triple.fi. The clear's are still there but damn the bass is much better. The rubber tube retains the crystal clear highs but the complay derived bass is still there. The normal comply insertion way you lose a lot of highs, but this you lose very very minimal highs as the mids and lows now are more prominent.

If this mod has already been suggested ignore this.

 

[Frosti]

I've purchased 10 medium olives and did the mod, i used tweezers and a screwdriver

Results:
1.they are too big to fit inside my ears!
I didnt took the fact that their maid for much smaller IEM's and on SF5P are too big to insert into my ears!
I havent tested the isolation properly yet but it seems much worse then UE silicons (due the fact that they sit outside)

Sound:
Soundstage seems abit better (because they are physically farther away from my head),
I havent trimmed the tips and so the highs get a bit muffled sometimes, GREAT!
My X5/spf5pro combo have a very harsh highs and the muffling is welcomed!

Overall pretty disappointing, maybe i'll try to return them for the small sized olives (i use medium UE silicon's)

 

[Beefy]

How on earth do you think you will return them after doing that to them?!?

 

[jegarn]

thinking about ordering some foamies but cant decide on the size. with my e2c I used the medium yellow foamies or the small silicon's. on my Tf10 I use the small silicon's from the e2c. should I get small or medium black foamies?