Camphor Burl with a custom stain. Zach did good!
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Yeah man, those are sweet. Congrats!
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Oh my, they’re gorgeous. Congratulations on owning such a stunning set of headphones.
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Congrats on this very nice set!
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Those are lovely! Enjoy your new cans 
I will say this for the ZMF process - Zach is super kind, patient and great to work with, but I wish there was more transparency in what can be achieved with staining, like a gallery of what has been achieved previously with woods. I had asked about wood stains for my incoming camphor burls and it kind of ended on a “the regular look is so nice, better to stick with that”. Had I seen these earlier on, I’d likely have pushed for some customs staining on my set, which are so far along now that I’d imagine it’s much too late to make that a reality. I understand they’re swamped and likely need to standardize the process as much as possible, but I’d have gladly paid extra and waited the extra time to get something like this for myself.
I’ll caveat that comment with part of that is on me for not knowing much about woodworking and what can be achieved, and I could probably have done more research myself, so the blame does sit with me in large part. It would just be helpful to have a resource to work with specific to the product.
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Shoutout to DMS for sending these out to us to take a look at! I’m hopefully going to be able to give these a quick listen before @Resolve swoops in and clutches them with his talons.
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There are at least two schools of thought with wood: (1) leave it natural, or (2) customize/‘improve’ the look through stain. With something as eye-catching as natural camphor burl, I also wouldn’t attempt to improve it. Highly figured, colorful woods are expensive from the start. Stain may just make the appearance worse than the starting point.
When using top-grade raw wood, my view is that a limited/light application stain mainly serves to bring out the figure in otherwise low-contrast details. I’d not attempt a serious color transformation – just switch to a different natural color of wood or a different sample from the same species. Wood has umpteen natural colors and grain patterns. With other products it’s also very popular to add layered or laminated wood. These can be attractive (and relatively inexpensive), but maybe not best for resonant headphone applications.
Stain is extremely popular for making (cheap) white woods dark and therefore more desirable. The world’s supply of dark walnut, ebony and such could be sold several times over. Without dark veneers and stains, the supply would end up with the ultra wealthy. So, using a stain on high-end wood…can go against its high status vibe…
Most anything can be achieved. It’s easier and more natural looking to start with wood in color/pattern one desires than to modify the wood.
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I appreciate you taking the time to explain all of that!
Highly figured, colorful woods are expensive from the start. Stain may just make the appearance worse than the starting point.
Fair point, and I think this goes back to my lack of understanding of wood to begin with - I see the Camphor Burl sets and think “those are beautiful”, but have no understanding of the rarity/value of said wood, which impacts my ability to understand what I’m asking the craftsman to do.
Having said that, @perogie your set looks amazing, and you picked a beautiful color for them.
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So after a couple months on the waiting list…
I have been slammed with work all day. So when it came, I only had a few minutes to unpack it (taking these pictures as I did) and do a basic “nothing is DOA” check. Hopefully in another hour or so I’ll be able to go and finally sit down to have a real listen…
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That’s a nice rig! Hope you enjoy.
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Congrats! What’s the comfort like on the RAAL? They’re super intriguing to me just from a build/aesthetic standpoint.
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Ohhh ohhh! I know this one. I know!
It’s not completely bizarre, but it kinda is. You have a headband on your head, but nothing around your ears, so that expected feeling of having headphones on is only half there. It’s pretty comfortable though, just odd to get used to. You also have to resist the urge to fiddle with the wings constantly. Well, at least I did.
It’s easy to get used to how they feel though, and it’s pretty comfortable.
That’s my impressions after a 1.5 hour test drive anyway. I know, it’s not much.
I’ve had way too much coffee
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So bear in mind, right now I have less than an hour of usage on them. First observation is they are very light (especially compared to my HEDDs, but also compared to my Stellia that I use in the home office). They have a weird pressure on the temples slightly above and in front of the ears (there is a little pad there with direct contact). I think that’s one of the things that some adjustment might help (see the YouTube video from RAAL about adjusting the fit). The SR1a have a thin strap over your head and a thin strap behind your head, which are a weird sensation right now, but I suspect something I will get used to. The strap over the head is actually a lot more noticeable than the HEDD’s headband since that is wider and thus more surface area to distribute the weight. (I’ve also seen comment from a number of people that they remove the rear strap – I have not tried that yet) The HEDDs were WAY more uncomfortable when I first got them, though I did eventually get used to them (mostly, anyway).
The most annoying thing so far with the SR1a is the headphone cable attachment points. They stick down a fair bit, and the cable is semi-stuff. Result is when you tilt your head down (such as looking down at a laptop in your lap), they end up bumping into my collar bone.
I have been mostly listening so far with the flaps at about 45 degrees. Even with them fully closed, I haven’t experienced the “cheese grater on your ears” sensation that I’ve read others complain about. With them fully open, bass response falls off DRASTICALLY. But at 45 degrees, I can’t complain about the bass. And with them fully closed, bass is perhaps even a bit overbearing… But I am liking the overall sound a lot. They seem a lot more airy/open than the HEDDs, for example. (And I liked the HEDD sound enough to power through getting used to their weight/lack-of-comfort…)
Again, these are all VERY early impressions. So big grain of salt… Also, while I don’t believe it materially affects the sound of the headphones, facilitated by ordering direct from RAAL, I requested a custom length for the headphone cable. So instead of the standard seven footer, mine is twenty. (The HEDDs are connected to the Bartok with a similar length of balanced cabled – 3m third-party balanced (ordered before HEDD introduced their own balanced cable) plus a 2m extension.)
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New demo toy from @jb77 just arrived!
Plus lots of tubes to play with!
Thank you @jb77 you are the best!
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First purchase from headphones.com. Excited to give it a try. At least I don’t need to wait for good weather like the Astro binoculars I bought this week 
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Thats the golden rule of amateur astronomy: new equipment equals clouds.
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