Turntable suggestions?

;-)

Say Ramon, which sub chassis did you go with? I, first, tried the Cetech, which I found a,worthwhile upgrade. Then Audio Innovations. It was even better.

If the originalmposter were to go the Linn route, I'd let you have my Valhalla power supply and Cetech subchassis/arm board cheap cheap.

I got the original bonded sub chassis, before the cirkus sub chassis came out, lingo 1 power supply (recently upgraded by Class A audio in England),
original trampolin base, and now I'm getting the cirkus spec inner platter and bearing to put on a Sole sub chassis.

While i might well have made this reply privately to Ramon68, it serves to bettr illustrate the topical point.

I, too, have the Sole subchassis, and picke up a second hand lingo. Linns upgrades can be hideously expensive, but third party options, like the Sole, are a fraction of the cost, yet offfer much more than a fraction of the performance.

Another important thing to bear in min is that setting up a Linn isnt the dark art they would have you believe. I did all my own surgery on my Linn, right in my living room. There are excellent tutorials on the net for how to do it.

A general point about turntable design is illustrated by a demonstration I heard back in the 80s. I listened to a Technics and a Linn both mounted with the same arm and cartridge.
The Technics had lower wow and flutter specs with its DC servo direct driven platter. The motor drive shaft is the turntable spindle on these tables. But in playing music, the Technics
slightly smeared the sonic picture compared to the Linn. An illustration of "If it measures good and sounds bad, you're measuring the wrong thing". The Technics servo was always hunting
for the correct speed, correcting speed errors many times a second. These minute speed changes resulted in the smearing I heard. The slower changes in speed that occur in a belt drive table
are much easier for the ear to accommodate to.

I give credit to Linn and Ivor T. for continuing to support the LP-12 with end user installable upgrades like Lingo, Cirkus, Trampolin, etc. The upgrades aren't cheap, but they certainly are cheaper than buying a new high end turntable. I am not a fan, however, of their thrust bearing design which is subject to wear. Linn is the only turntable maker--that I know of--that specs main bearing wear tolerance. FYI: I never measured the wear on my first two Linns, but my third Linn had measurable thrust bearing wear.

As it turns out the LP's I thought were packed away in a fairly stable container which was a Rubbermaid container which was in the basement of my house which flooded unfortunatley had a crack in it. Water leaked in and the LP's and covers and sleeves and seem to be damaged. Thhe sleeves are stuck to the vinyl and if i peel them off the sleeve material which is more than likely mostly paper has stuck to the vinyl. Any suggestions on how to recover these LP's. I'm not concerned about the covers or sleeves...just the vinyl.

If I soak the vinyl in a mild soapy solution to disolve the paper do you think that will remove the paper adequately? I'm afraid that it won't and i'll be scraping the paper and maybe glue out of the grooves with the stylus.

It may be easier to try to replace the collection. There is a store in town that specializes in vintage vinyl snd cd's.

*sigh*....its never easy.

I guess that keeping then soaked in plain water is a beginner.
Then peeling off the paper would be possible. If they will dry up it
might glue hard to the vinyl and be difficult to peel off.

I think your warm soapy water will do the trick. You'll know quickly if you've got 'em clean enough!

I got a shock when lifted the cue arm (of my then new tone arm) at the end of a record, and it caused the needle to skip out of the groove and play the label! What an awful sound. This is because the cue arm was still a little stiff, so the up force made the armboard bounce (my record player has a spring suspension supporting the platter and arm board).

Anyway, bring a long story to a fast conclusion, my friendly neighborhood tone-arm maker laughed at me and reassured me that it takes a lot more than that to damage a stylus.

A little residual paper and glue will sound bad, but you're unlikely to destroy your expensive stylus.

That happened to about 100 of my records. Fortunately, they had plastic inner sleeves. Washing the LPs is fine, but make sure you keep the labels dry.
With only one box LPs, you may not see the value in spending $600 on a VPI 16.5. So wash them by hand and have lots of freshly laundered terry towels
on hand to blot them dry. Before you start, have a nylon bristle record cleaning brush on hand to get into the grooves and dislodge any crud from the grooves.
If you have any tinkering skills, you can make label sized puck turntable with a center post to turn the record on as you clean its wet surface with the brush. Then
rinse thoroughly in luke warm tap water and blot dry. Finally, air dry before returning to a new plastic sleeve and new jacket. (Check out Sleeve City for sleeves
and jackets).

Ramon, Are you copying my life? I have that record cleaning machine!

I have bought flood-damaged records, with the paper inner sleeves stuck to the vinyl and with mold and fungus growing on them, for a few cents apiece from thrift shops; and have had good results:

1. Soak them in water with dishwashing detergent dissolved in it until the paper soaks through and can easily be peeled off.

2. Carefully brush them along the grooves (avoid the labels) with a painting pad available at your nearby Lowe's or Home Depot for around $3 (and elsewhere, too...if you are cheap like me, the Dollar Tree store sells 'em, and they would work just as well but the handles aren't as nice).

3. Wash them again with clean warm-hot water/detergent and a clean paint pad (avoid the labels). Change or wash these paint pads often. If you are cheap like me, this is another reason to get them from the Dollar Tree. Rinse with warm water.

4. Dry them thoroughly with a vacuum record cleaning machine. If you are cheap like me, you can do the same thing with a shop vacuum and a crevice tool, modified with a slot and velvet "lips" to prevent scratching the records. Your brother's old junky BSR record changer is handy to rotate the records as you do so; you'll finally have a use for the 16rpm speed.

5. Stand them up in a dishrack until the labels are thoroughly dry.

I also experimentally tried washing them in a dishwasher, using home-made label protectors made of roundels of wood and rubber gasketing, and secured by a bolt and wingnut though the center hole. That worked well, if followed with the vacuum suction for drying, but it would have been more work to make a lot of label protectors than it was worth. WARNING: Beware the heating coils in the bottom of the dishwasher! I have a BOSCH dishwasher which does not have heating coils in the bottom of the dishwasher tub, instead having an inline water heater. Some other makes have a control for air drying only, but the heating coils in those still are used to heat the wash water and might create too much heat for records in the bottom rack, even when immersed in water.

I'll give those cleaning suggestions a try. Hopefuly I'll be able to salvage a few of them. I remember there being some Mobile Fidelity's in my collection.

Back to the subject. I take it the reason Stanton turntables haven't been suggested is because they really aren't audiophile turntables?

I had never heard of Stanton turntables until I read your question, although I did own a Stanton 681ee cart. Anyway, long story short, get yourself a Rega RP1
and you will have a competent belt drive TT with an arm that punches way above its weight. You will hear a lot more of what is in the grooves with a fine
instrument that can extract that information.

I second the Rega as. Great value. And note that, in addition to its great Rega tone arm, Audio Origami makes a Rega-specific tone arm that is amazing. (I have an AO on my Linn).

Sprags wrote:As it turns out the LP's I thought were packed away in a fairly stable container which was a Rubbermaid container which was in the basement of my house which flooded unfortunatley had a crack in it. Water leaked in and the LP's and covers and sleeves and seem to be damaged. Thhe sleeves are stuck to the vinyl and if i peel them off the sleeve material which is more than likely mostly paper has stuck to the vinyl. Any suggestions on how to recover these LP's. I'm not concerned about the covers or sleeves...just the vinyl.

If I soak the vinyl in a mild soapy solution to disolve the paper do you think that will remove the paper adequately? I'm afraid that it won't and i'll be scraping the paper and maybe glue out of the grooves with the stylus.

It may be easier to try to replace the collection. There is a store in town that specializes in vintage vinyl snd cd's.

*sigh*....its never easy.

You might try one of these http://www.amazon.com/In-The-Groove-Record-Cleaner/dp/B004MG9YYQ/ref=sr_1_7?ie=UTF8&qid=1365720602&sr=8-7&keywords=record+cleaners to get any leftover debris out of the grooves. I find it works fairly well.

Best Regards,
Charlie

I would avoid washing records with hot water. I purchased the Spin Clean Mk II record cleaner and have been impressed with it. It is available from Amazon for $80, usually with free shipping. The Spin Clean will not remove stuck-on paper, but it will clean your records deep down into the grooves after you get the paper off. The process is utterly manual and somewhat time consuming. Personally, I would not use a nylon brush on a record. Velvet or AdioQuest CF record brush or the paint pads mentioned above have been shown to be safe.
...j

I use Diskwasher microfiber brushes for routine record washing and an old Watts nylon fiber brush for tough jobs. Its bristles taper to an 0.00025 point
to get to the bottom of the grooves and it is perfectly safe.

FWIW - here in FL the water's hard enough to leave a residue.
Get a jug of distilled water from the grocery store for your final rinse.
For me - just buying used Salvation Army records -
warm water and dish soap with a microfiber buffing pad as a sponge (any hardware store has the pads)
warm tap rince, then distilled, then blot dry.
That's taken off some pretty ugly stuff, even labels!

ramon68 wrote:...an old Watts nylon fiber brush for tough jobs. Its bristles taper to an 0.00025 point
to get to the bottom of the grooves and it is perfectly safe.

It was the brush supplied with the original Keith Monks Record Cleaning Machine.

Try Dave, at Vinyl Nirvana, here at http://www.vinylnirvana.com/
Very helpful chap. He restores and sells vintage AR and Thorens turntables at very sensible prices.
I am at present running a VPI Traveler and an Audio Technica 440 cart and am well pleased with it. Fought some gigantic low-fequency rumble issues, though.
To make a long story longer, I started out with the base-line Rega. It was a POS. Ran backwards half the time; you had to stop the platter with your hand and spin it in the right direction.
I went to many people to solve the low-freq rumble problem with the VPI. VPI said to increase tracking pressure; Dick Vandersteen, who built my speakers, suggested mounting the turntable to a bearing wall which vibrates at a different frequency than the floor, eliminating physical feedback.
Then came the turntable base, which sets the whole mess on a quad of tennis balls. I guess for extra money you can fill it with sand.
Still rumbling, a very scary 25 Hz or so.
Last tweak, which finally fixed it, was adjusting the tone-arm angle relative to the platter. Just a bubble off horizontal and now, no more scary thumping.
I should have read this first: http://www.audiophilia.com/wp/?p=510
Covers about every issue I fumbled through...
To do it all over again, I'd get one of Dave's Thorens or ARs and put the saved money into one of those $350 wooden Grado carts.

Thanks! That looks like a good source for what I'm looking for. I'll have to wait a few months though.

Sprags wrote:Thanks! That looks like a good source for what I'm looking for. I'll have to wait a few months though.

Another guy to talk to is Kevin at KAB Electro Accoustics: http://www.kabusa.com/frameset.htm?/
I don't think he sells turntables but is a good source for cartridges and other turntable tweaks and a very helpful guy.

The vinyl renaissance has not caught on where I live, in northern Idaho. I bought a box of 50 unplayed LPs for $5 the other day. There were some dandies in there. Garage sales are our friends.

If you're in a similar backwater, I'd suggest putting some of your "mad money" into loading up on vinyl while it's still cheap.

Cheerio
d

Sounds like you resolved your issue but I think you were having a LF feedback issue, not rumble. Ordinarily rumble is associated with main bearing noise. If you have dynamic speakers with a removable grill, you can probably "see" any rumble that your bearing is producing. Rumble will often result in visible cycling of woofers at sub audible frequencies. You can be certain that your amplifier's power supply notices this sort of rumble as well!
...j

There is several sources for rumble. Main bearing is one of the least
common one (for turntables of any decent make)
Engine vibrations another, tonearm/cartridge resonances yet another
Dirty/worn idler wheel, etc.

j beede wrote:Sounds like you resolved your issue but I think you were having a LF feedback issue, not rumble. Ordinarily rumble is associated with main bearing noise. If you have dynamic speakers with a removable grill, you can probably "see" any rumble that your bearing is producing. Rumble will often result in visible cycling of woofers at sub audible frequencies. You can be certain that your amplifier's power supply notices this sort of rumble as well!
...j

Beede, you are entirely correct. I've been wrongly using the terms interchangeably, and my issue was definitely LF feedback. A very simple way to tell which is which, I learned from some friendly advice while troubleshooting this nettlesome problem, is to place the stylus on a record with the turntable not turning. If the issue presents itself, it's definitely feedback; if not, and it only happens with the platter spinning, then it's rumble. I also learned about effective tone-arm mass and how it interacts with cartridge behaviour.

Problem with the Vandersteens is that the sub-woofs fire downward; you can't see what they're up to.

At any rate, QED, problem solved. And while Dick Vandersteen's advice of mounting the table on a bearing wall away from floor harmonics did not itself resolve the issue, it was good advice anyway and definitely altered the LF feedback dynamics till I got the tone-arm angle just right. The subwoofs on the 5 and 7 series Vandies will actually respond down to 15 Hz.

Has anyone on this thread had any experience with the wooden Grado Reference series carts (high-output)? I'd be interested in your thoughts. I'm quite satisfied with the AT 440 but someone has suggested the Grado would be a step-level improvement.

Thanks