I woke up this morning wanted to some DIY, I was going to replace the 1950's kitchen light with somthing modern, but since checking the wiring I have to decided to replace the wiring a later date, this will involve taking the floorboards up in my room so its a major job. I then thought about fixing the sash on my window before deciding to leave to the joiners. So then I had one look at my scrap wood speaker stands and I have t decided to try and build some better ones. The problem is what ever I do it will have to be simple and cheap and better than my currect ones! Some of you may remember me posting a picture of them on groovehandle. [IMG]http://www.robertsonnet.co.uk/hifi.jpg[/IMG] My system no longer looks quite like that as I have a midi sized DVD player where cassete deck is on that picture. But the stands are still the same. My ideas for new stands basicaly consists of: Having MDF bases, proper speaker spikes, or maybe just nails until I can get hold of some cheap spikes. Using pastic drain pipes for the tubes of the stands, then filling them with sand. Using silcone to glew the pipes to the MDF bases. The problem is I know that stands don't just need to be sturdy but they also need to absorb the vibrations to the speakers rather than react to them hence causing unwanted vibrations. I am not sure how to get round this problem. My tool kit consists of: 1) A soldering iron which is never used on anything worth more than £10 due to the amount of stuff I have destroyed like my perfectly good dual turntbale I melted the PCB on by trying to the replace the interconnects! 2) A few car spanners 3) A jig saw (perfect for this job) 4) Hand saw 5) Drills 6) All the other stuff I intend to paint the stands in a black matt finish. Thanks for any advice.