As promised, here's a “mod” of sorts. I was concerned about the bounce of the NXT on the stock stand going from one end of the neck to the other, so I adapted a Proline speaker stand to work with the NXT stand.
The goal was not to have to modify any NXT stand part, and I didn't, except for taking the top tube that has the swivel mount on it out of the NXT stand base.
Tools needed:
1. 1. Hacksaw or tubing cutter (One point I'd like to mention here is the advantage of the hacksaw over the pipe cutter. The pipe cutter smooshes the metal in toward the center of the pipe as it cuts, and for the top of the leg tubes, and all the cuts on the vertical pipe, this has to be removed with something...I used a Dremel tool with a small sanding drum, the hacksaw method would be more difficult to get a nice level cut, but would probably be easier to clean up... I used the pipe cutter because I did this early in the morning before everybody was up!)
2. 1/4 inch drill bit & drill
3. Phillips screwdriver
4. Pliers, preferably needle-nose
5. Pencil (for marking tubing)
6. 1 inch Forstner drill bit (for drilling the center of the PVC couplers so the NXT top tube fits in it)
7. Electricians tape
Purchase:
1. A Proline or other speaker stand (they had the Proline LST2BK on sale at Guitar Center for $39.99),
2. 12 ¼ inch nylon washers
3. 2- 1 in. to 1 in. pvc pipe couplers.
These instructions are for how to duplicate exactly how I built mine, it took me about 4 hours one morning, your mileage may vary.
1. Take the speaker stand completely apart, except you don't need to take the tightening knobs or the other bolts off that hold the plastic reducer/couplers to the vertical pipe, just loosen them so you can take them off. Carefully save all the nuts, bolts, and washers (well you don't need the old washers, but I collect washers...you never know when you might need them...).
2. Cut each leg tube top 8 3/8 in. above the center of the screw hole in the middle of the leg that attached to the skinny metal leg spreader bar. Then cut the bottom to 11 5/8 in. below the center of that same screw hole.
3. Drill a ¼ in. hole completely through both sides of the upper leg exactly 5/16 in. from the top edge of the leg. Make sure you are as parallel as possible to the holes in the center of the leg...very important!
4. Re-assemble any caps or feet (mine had both, I suspect all the brands will.) to the three legs.
5. Take the 3 skinny spreader bars and cut them to 9 3/4in. Long. Then shape the cut end to round it off so it looks nice, and drill a ¼ in. hole 5/16 in. from the new cut end. Note that the speaker stand spreader bar length will be the same length as on the NXT stand (don't go thinkin' I used any math to figure this out!).
6. Cut the outer vertical tube (the one the spreader bars bolt to on the bottom, not the center one that goes up and down) 22 7/8 in. long from the bottom (that has the three holes for the spreader bars). Clean up the cut end.
7. Cut the vertical sliding tube (the one that goes up and down) to 22 5/8 in. measured from the top. Mine has less safety pin holes near the top, that's why I did it, though for a stand that is rated to hold 150lb, the holes are probably not a big deal.
8. Re-assemble the lower part of the stand, but use the nylon washers instead of the metal ones (if your speaker stand came with metal ones). I used one on each side of the lower end of the spreader bars, and one on each side of the leg tube for the upper end of the spreader bars. This helps cut down noise from vibration. My nylon washers were a little thicker that the metal ones they replaced, but the bolts and nuts did fit ...just.
9. Take the vertical sliding tube and see if you can press the PVC couplers into the top and bottom. Don't push in all the way yet, just enough to see if they'll go! I had two different kinds, (different manufacturers) and one I could press in about ¾ of the way, the other no way. So what I did with the one that was too big was cut through it along it's long axis top to bottom, so that it could compress as I slid it into the vertical sliding tube. I actually had to sand it wider a couple ties to get a firm fit. You want a really really firm fit.
10. Once you've got your PVC couplers so they'll fit VERY firmly, take and drill out the centers, with the couplers just in the top and bottom, with the 1 inch Forstner bit. The shaft of the NXT top tube is almost exactly 1 inch.
11. The top coupler on mine I did not force all the way in as you can see in the pic, and I'm glad, as I have a mod on that in mind... details in a minute.
12. The bottom coupler you should shove in about 6 inches from the bottom of the speaker stand sliding tube, so the shaft of the NXT sliding tube will slip into it. You may want to use a broomstick handle or dowel like I did to push it up there.
13. To prevent vibration of the speaker stand sliding tube against the bottom vertical tube, I wrapped about 3 layers of electrician's tape around the very bottom edge of the sliding tube.
The stand works very well for me, at the cost of about $44US after taxes for the stand and washers (I had the PVC couplers lying around, but they should be less than $1US ea.
Now a couple comments:
1. It fits in the NXT soft case pocket for the NXT stand!
Just barely. One could saw off a bit of the outer edges of the three way sliding leg support to gain a bit of slack, but the Proline fits.
2. The bass will rotate in the couplers freely. This doesn't bother me, but I suspect that one could somehow drill through the speaker stand sliding pipe, and the upper PVC coupler, and the NXT sliding part to fix this. Or, I have toyed with the idea of slotting the top PVC coupler, and the top 6 inches or so of the speaker sliding pipe so that tightening the upper sliding pipe clamp would take care of it by squeezing it all together.
3. The lowest height of the stand without the sliding tube is 27 ½ in. (vs. 24 ½ in. for the original stand). I think you could take a couple inches off the legs to help with this. And if you wanted to play with the geometry, indeed more from the other two pipes.
My next project is a different bass mount that will allow rotation in all three axis. One of the things that bugs me about the alt-az type mount of the stock stand is I can't tilt the neck. We'll see how that goes.
