I am still thinking about it. The issue continues to be the high cost. My original thought was that the membership/visitors would step in to defray some of the cost. There hasn't been much input on that. The donations I receive now is great for the current work we do but it is not going to fund this major expenditure/expansion.
I think the high cost of good measurements is not compatible with a free forum. You could run an independent measurement lab, and charge money to measure gear. There maybe enough market demand for that, from magazines to small manufacturers, etc. That could offset the cost of running a lab.
For the forum, you could publish free "rankings", but charge a fee for detailed charts or EQ settings. The fee should be a sliding scale, like 10% of the suggested retail price of the equipment with a $30 floor per chart. I think charts like
these are worth at least $30 per to me.