Speakers as "invisible fencing?"

[DizRotus]

My son's significant other wants stained H2s with grill cloths, rather than KP-201s or HIPs ,as their main speakers.  I can understand the aesthetic preference, but I question the lifespan of the now excellent grill cloth material after being exposed to their cats.  The KP-201s, with their metal screen grills, would be a safer choice, which my son prefers.  Nonetheless, the woman wants stained brown, rather than black.

 

Has anyone tried using speakers as "invisible fencing?"  I'm thinking that waiting until a cat expresses any curiosity and gets close to the speaker, a blast of noise from the speaker will scare it away.  After a few such blasts, the cats might get the idea to stay away.  Has anyone tried this?

[Coytee]

Not on a cat but rather....my best friend at the time.

 

LaScalas were new (this is 1979) my HS buddy was over to hear them.  I had them hooked to a Yamaha receiver AND had the mute button depressed.  Started the TT and had Boston's Long Time.  During the quiet intro part, I turned the volume knob to something like 1:00 position (remember, mute was on)

 

As song progressed, my buddy got closer to them and literally had his face about 12" from them.  Intro progressed to that initial creshendo and right as it went ballistic (with my friends face about 12" away) I "unclicked" the mute button, adding I think 20 db's to the sound.

 

He literally jumped backwards about 5 feet and landed on his butt.

 

Scared the daylights out of him.

 

It really was a funny moment (for me.....  a touch less funny for him)

 

 

[Thaddeus Smith]

I've done this with cats and my horn subs.. The mouths are just so interesting. They'll going there from time to time during storms, but otherwise stay away. The goal was to prevent them from trying to go deeper

[Coytee]

Yeah, but what happens when your cat is chasing a mouse and it goes back into the labrynth of your horn?

 

(happened to me, had to wait the mouse out to be sure it left and didn't crawl inside the slot & start chewing up the driver)

 

 

[dtel]

A long time ago we had a cat that was attracted to speakers, I used a spray bottle set to shoot a stream. Anytime the cat wen toward the speaker I would squirt it somewhat up as to fall on him, it freaked him out and eventually worked. Sometimes I would shoot it directly at him if he wasn't looking at me, it was actually a little fun to watch his reaction. 

[billybob]

Spraybottles work but looking at a 24/7 situation. Some cats like music but even if super loud, again the 24/7 deal. The Pavlov effect of conditioning for cats only goes so far. Some things that I thought cats would be attracted to, did not happen. Other times, after initial introduction to them, their curiosity was satisfied.

It is a difficult proposition at times to counteract. If I had Heresy of any type, I would raise them off of floor as, a cat I know (female) eventually made a habit of spraying my floorstanders through the grille, unseen and un-noticed. Too late, the damage done. 

As for no grilles, no way I can trust any cat with a woofer. Thought about blocking bottom part of tallish floorstander. grille, but with what?

Now I think I would try something to block the grille while not in use or, away from home. All it takes is one or two effective attacks to P*** you

off...Good fortune

[KlipschFish]

One year we had a mouse make room just inside the port of my old RF-35's. We have dogs that use a doggy door to go outside.

More than once a local raccoon would come in and wash and munch on dog kibble. It usually happened late night or early morning when we were asleep. We only had signs that she would come in. She (he? I dunno) became comfortable enough to start coming in when we were still on the sofa. So much so that my wife named her "Baby". Well, one night apparently, she got wind of the mouse in the 35's and tried to get at it.

I was amazed to wake up and see, the next morning, that 'Baby' had pulled the acoustic foam out from the backside of the inner 35, ALL THE WAY OUT THROUGH THE 3" PORT IN ONE PIECE!!  Approximately 1' x 4' batting out in one piece. Pretty dexterous. Had to learn how to take apart MY BABY to fix.

Wish I'd know of an invisible fence then!

 

[KlipschFish]

Now I just turn the RF-7's up till nothing approaches our house.

BTW we did start to 'lock' the doggy door at night!

Edited April 14, 2018 by KlipschFish

[DizRotus]

7 hours ago, Coytee said:

Not on a cat but rather....my best friend at the time.

 

LaScalas were new (this is 1979) my HS buddy was over to hear them.  I had them hooked to a Yamaha receiver AND had the mute button depressed.  Started the TT and had Boston's Long Time.  During the quiet intro part, I turned the volume knob to something like 1:00 position (remember, mute was on)

 

As song progressed, my buddy got closer to them and literally had his face about 12" from them.  Intro progressed to that initial creshendo and right as it went ballistic (with my friends face about 12" away) I "unclicked" the mute button, adding I think 20 db's to the sound.

 

He literally jumped backwards about 5 feet and landed on his butt.

 

Scared the daylights out of him.

 

It really was a funny moment (for me.....  a touch less funny for him)

 

 

 

Yes, but did he ever scratch at the speakers again?

[DizRotus]

7 hours ago, Coytee said:

 

Not on a cat but rather....my best friend at the time.

 

I did something similar to a friend.  He was asleep feet from a Bose 901 powered by 400 watts of Dynaco power.  While listening to DSOTM, the volume was set to zero until the part where the many clocks chime, at which point the volume was cranked way up.  I swear my friend levitated from the bed.

[Coytee]

2 hours ago, DizRotus said:

 

I did something similar to a friend.  He was asleep feet from a Bose 901 powered by 400 watts of Dynaco power.  While listening to DSOTM, the volume was set to zero until the part where the many clocks chime, at which point the volume was cranked way up.  I swear my friend levitated from the bed.

 

I swear...  we gotta be related.  I did near that exact thing in college.  Freshman year (preface that I'm an early to bed, early to rise)  All the freshman yahoo's were up until 3:00 every morning of every day...  drove me nuts.  They'd yell & moan to us morning people to be quiet...didn't we know others were TRYING to sleep???

 

I'd had enough.

 

One weekend, I went home.  I had a timer from an old VCR so hooked it to stereo.  Set needle on those DSOTM chimes, put the volume about 1:00 again, set them to go off about 5:00 a.m. when I was out of town.  After couple minutes, shut entire thing down.

 

Seems it near woke the building and by the time the RA could get into my room, it shut down.  I got some hell when I got back but my point was made and everyone respected everyone just a bit more after that.

 

(most of the neighbors in the dorm had NO clue what I had stuffed into the room because again....I tried to respect their peace & quiet....  btw, this is what I had in there in addition to LaScalas which you can see and a pair of EV Interface D's)

 

 

[Peter P.]

You can purchase custom cut metal grilles cut to fit any size speaker.

 

I'd buy a pair of those and spray paint them whatever color your wife wants.

[dirtmudd]

22 hours ago, DizRotus said:

My son's significant other wants stained H2s with grill cloths, rather than KP-201s or HIPs ,as their main speakers.  I can understand the aesthetic preference, but I question the lifespan of the now excellent grill cloth material after being exposed to their cats.  The KP-201s, with their metal screen grills, would be a safer choice, which my son prefers.  Nonetheless, the woman wants stained brown, rather than black.

 

Has anyone tried using speakers as "invisible fencing?"  I'm thinking that waiting until a cat expresses any curiosity and gets close to the speaker, a blast of noise from the speaker will scare it away.  After a few such blasts, the cats might get the idea to stay away.  Has anyone tried this?

Razor wire will work... And a nice industrial look

 

[DizRotus]

1 hour ago, Peter P. said:

You can purchase custom cut metal grilles cut to fit any size speaker.

 

I'd buy a pair of those and spray paint them whatever color your wife wants.

 

Thanks for the link.  A black pair of those might do the trick.  Do you, or any other forum members, have personal experience with the products? BTW, she is not my wife, she is my son’s significant other.

 

If my geriatric memory is sufficiently caffeinated, I recall a company of the same name with the same, or similar, logo in the Chicago area decades ago.

[DizRotus]

3 minutes ago, dirtmudd said:

Razor wire will work... And a nice industrial look

 

 

As the landlord, I don’t want cat blood all over the place.  

[dirtmudd]

2 minutes ago, DizRotus said:

 

As the landlord, I don’t want cat blood all over the place.  

My friends cat 🐱 destroyed his speakers....

 

Claw scratches on the veneer....

 

But as a landlord ... Your policy cats should be declawed ... That could be a option ... Or just no pets..

[pzannucci]

Look at the metal grill material like at Parts Express.  Form the grills with that.  I don't think the claws will have much effect.  Could look good in place of cloth.

[SWL]

Get rid of the cats.

(easy for me to say, I'm allergic to cats)

Sent from my SM-G950U using Tapatalk

[YK Thom]

Until the cat is trained to scratch in an appropriate place perhaps put them on stands. It has been my experience with cats over the years that there is a sweet spot with regards to height that they like when they scratch. Something low, not interested, something high, not interested. They like to reach up a bit. A HII MIGHT be to low to be of interest. They are more likely to want to sit on top of them.

[Coytee]

I'm also allergic to cats....but have one.  Not only that, seems he's "chosen" me and will crawl on my lap if given the choice and his favorite place to lounge is right in front of me ON my desk as I sit here typing! 

 

Not a fan of declawing them unless very specifically, they are captive indoor cats.  Mine goes outside so needs them to defend, climb and at times (unfortunately) hunt...

 

My prior two cats (one of them) clawed the fronts of my EV Interface D's and when the fabric was gone, salivated at the chance to slice & dice up the VMR's which now sat exposed.  I didn't see it until too late and simply faced speakers (in storage in basement) to each other to eliminate anyone getting between them.

 

I guess I like cats.  (have three dogs too)

 

Back to the thread action...

 

I was told when a cat is clawing, you might be best served to give him a scratching post and evidently place it where he's loving to scratch.  In other words, don't do what my wife wanted to do....get him a scratching post and put it in the other room.... put it where his action is.