[bluemonkeyflyer]

Several pages back and a few weeks ago, Arnaud gave an eloquent explanation, along with measurement graphs, of how very loosely woven material in the cups result in the perception of greater space or soundstage (I hope I accurately paraphrased, Arnaud). With this in mind, it might be worth a trial if you care to try out the "Less is More?" mod or the "Transpore mod" I posted a few days ago. They include reversible mods of Paxmate Plus in the cup bottoms, tungsten putty in the back baffles, Dynamat around the drivers, paper lifters under the rear side of the pads, and all else stock:
 
Take a medium (I know, what is "medium?") 100% cotton ball and tear it in half. Tease it out in all 3 dimensions until it is the size of the cup bottoms and about 1/2" thick. If you hold it up to the light, it will appear very thin an porous. Place one in each cup between the Paxmate and the tungsten putty (or plasticine). Next, take two Kleenex tissues and fold them over and then roll up into 5" x 1/2" 'ropes' and place one under the back side of the ear pads.
 
I think the reason I did not achieve good results with cotton in previous attempts is because the cotton was too dense.  With this very light and open cotton "puck", well, I'll leave it to you to form your own opinion.
 
If you no longer have the stock white driver material in place, and if you are looking for an alternative, Transpore is pretty dang good stuff. You can tune for bass heavy with 1 layer, bass medium + nice treble with 1.5 layers, or bass light(er) + accented treble with 2 full layers. I've found that 1.5 is the "sweet spot" for me with 2 strips of 3/4" Transpore applied to the back of naked drivers (with about 1/8" overlap) and 1 strip applied perpendicular and on top of the first 2 strips. What is more remarkable is that I have not heard bass bloom into the midrange with any of these 3 configurations.
 
As always, my comments are offered for your consideration and trial: IMHO, My 2 cents, IME, and YMMV; sounds good to me but you make think it sucks. It's all good.

 

[200poundsofamp]

Here's Arnauds post if anyone's interested
 
edit: Another one.
 
That's pretty interesting. I know there's loose cotton or fiberfill or something in the back of the HE-500, guess there's a good reason for it.
 
Been looking through wikiphonia, several older orthos use some filler too. The YH-1000 uses dense fiberglass, the T20v2 and YH-3 uses synthetic foam.
 
Wonder if you could just put a thin piece of melamine foam over the back of the driver and fill the rest with loose cotton? Maybe a piece of felt as well if that alone doesn't cut it. Seems like it would soak up most of the backwave without taking up much volume and give you a huge soundstage.

 

[sphinxvc]

Guys, re that post 2 pages back (on Smeggy's comparison of LCD-2 pads vs. O2 pads) : why do more people go with O2 pads than LCD-2 pads?  According to Smeggy's comments the LCD-2 pads seem to win out on isolation, sound and soundstage, plus they are cheaper.
 
 
Quote:

Stax. Good isolation, very comfortable, good sound +, decent soundstage, very expensive.

LCD2 rev1 pads. Very good isolation, good comfort, very good sound, good soundstage +, moderately expensive.

 
Thanks.

 

[sphinxvc]

So I listened to these most of the day at work today & on my commute -- on the way back I happened to catch my reflection in a train window and man are these things ugly on the head.  

 
Also, I think if I want to use them portable I'll need to invest in a proper amp -- the ipod just didn't cut it.

 

[proid]

Quote:

Guys, re that post 2 pages back (on Smeggy's comparison of LCD-2 pads vs. O2 pads) : why do more people go with O2 pads than LCD-2 pads?  According to Smeggy's comments the LCD-2 pads seem to win out on isolation, sound and soundstage, plus they are cheaper.
 
 
 
Thanks.

According to smeggy, the beyer velour pad is even cheaper, sound and soundstage better the downside is only the isolation

 

[DaBomb77766]

Hmm...wonder how one of those Mr. Clean Magic Erasers would work here?

 

[200poundsofamp]

Just tried some very thin cotton, most noticeable thing was that it boosted the treble a lot. Seemed a little less clear too, not sure why. Didn't notice a big difference with the soundstage.
 
Think I may have filled too much space with it though. Here's how the HE-500 does it:
 

 
Maybe just a thin layer of it would be best.

 

[sphinxvc]

Ok -- what the heck -- just ordered the LCD-2 pads, I figured if it's that close I'll just go with the pads that cost the same as the HPs, makes me feel less silly.
 
Hopefully I get the Rev. 2 pads, I've been reading about people ordering and receiving Rev. 1 pads.  

 

[Nevod]

Quote:

According to smeggy, the beyer velour pad is even cheaper, sound and soundstage better the downside is only the isolation

IMHO, the best earpad would be an gel earpad with relour interior. You can emulate it by covering inner surface of an leather/pleather/gel earpad with paxmate and felt. Just be sure there is still place for ears.

 

[vafan13]

I wonder what, and how much modification is required to get the velour pads to work.  I like the velour pads on my dt880s, almost tempted to buy a pair and give it a shot. Rather not have to tear them up to get them to work though.
 
Quote:

According to smeggy, the beyer velour pad is even cheaper, sound and soundstage better the downside is only the isolation

I wonder if i could take an old pair of beyer velour pads from my dt880s, cut the outer half of the donut off and use them to line the inside of the stock t50rp pads. Or just buy some velour from Michaels.  hmmmm
 
Quote:

IMHO, the best earpad would be an gel earpad with relour interior. You can emulate it by covering inner surface of an leather/pleather/gel earpad with paxmate and felt. Just be sure there is still place for ears.

 

 

[micmacmo]

Quote:

 

...
I think the reason I did not achieve good results with cotton in previous attempts is because the cotton was too dense.  With this very light and open cotton "puck", well, I'll leave it to you to form your own opinion.
...

 
Thanks for this tip. I'd almost given up experimenting with wool batting, the stuff they use in winter quilts. It isn't fluffy like cotton balls but more like a loose wool felt that's about 1 to 2 mm thick. Even with one layer covering the back of the baffle it sounded slightly over-damped. It turns out that there was a very thin backing layer (I thought it was just a sheen leftover from manufacturing). With the backing off, the remaining wool fluffed easily into a relatively uniform 2-cm mat. I tried this in the cups and it's my current bass winner. Plenty of sub-bass without muddying up the mids. Phat, without being obese, if you get my drift.
 
I'm not sure how the mids and top end of the wool sound compared to teased cotton balls, but I think it's close. It'll require a bit closer comparison.   
 
 
Quote:

Hmm...wonder how one of those Mr. Clean Magic Erasers would work here?

I used it for a time. It's super easy to cut with a bread knife and I could get a relatively uniform slice as thin as 4 or 5 mm. But even at this thinness, it didn't deliver the extension at either end that I hear with teased wool or cotton balls. Plus, in some passages it sucked some of the fun out of the mids. But it's a cheap mod and I'd love to hear other people's experiences with it. 
 

 

[snakeeater69]

Are you guys getting thumping bass with these mods? Does the the cotton ball decrease bass?
----problem solved--
lol, problem was with the stock port felt area with being covered foam and I was using too much cotton balls

 

[rawrster]

It depends on the mod but the Rastapants 2 I get good amount of bass but not a bass monster by any means.
 
BMF, thanks for the tip. I did get the pads on but I have to take them off to do the BMF #6 (or whatever the most recent one is assumign I have all the materials) and then compare them to the Rastapants 2. Those pads seriously make you think you are dumb..a college degree and cant put on pads without help

 

[wdahm519]

Hey guys, just a heads up.  The new Yo Yo Ma CD "The Goat Rodeo Sessions" is an eargasm with a modded pair of T50RP's.  SO natural!  Very separated.  Incredible sound.

 

[snakeeater69]

This mod took longer that I expected.
 
Did the Rastapats 2i with so minor tweaks. 
Stock white felt on with reflex dot
2 jumbo cotton ball stuff on back of the cups.
Cup port area with stock felt
Outside port 3.5/4 cover with tape.
Sandwitch Pads T50RP + Shure 840
LFF's headband mod.
Nothing done to the ear side baffle.
Everything else the same as Rastapats 2.
 
Listening to music and watching movies on this headphone is crazy good. My last headphone purchase for a long, long time to come.
 
...on a side note the freaking Plasticsine was a bitch in the to work with.