Posted on 10/09/2020 11:22:11 AM PDT by Red Badger
“I’ve tried to use it occasionally since 1985 but the stylus is a problem on well used albums.”
Have you tried weighting it with a couple of quarters?
“still susceptible to heat and wear no?”
And continual dust build up on the stylus, staic and pops, etc. That backgound hiss and crackle, back when I could hear, was soooo magically gone when i finally got a CD player.
I do not miss the days of spending a few hundred dollars (which may as well been thousands then...) on a turntable, receiver and speakers...
Never had any B&O components but would have loved to.
Always looked forward to the Washington’s Birthday sales for the annual stylus/cartridge purchase. For some reason that was the time for those to be on sale in the NorthEast.
>The decades-old turntables were first taken apart, inspected and thoroughly cleaned before being reassembled.
Being almost 50 year old turntables I would think the two most significant issues that would have to be addressed would be the deterioration of rubber/plastic compounds and lubricants.
A large majority of speakers, after some decades, suffer from foam-rot. The surrounds quite literally disintegrate into dust. Likewise, the rubber dampers inside the phone cartridge have probably stiffened-up, thus preventing the stylus from moving freely.
Even worse, all three of my reel-to-reel tape decks are frozen due to the fact that the lubricant has turned into glue. The decks would have to be completely disassembled, cleaned with a solvent, re-lubricated, re-assembled and re-calibrated.
The mechanical parts in these turntables are also quire small, so much so that we are getting in to watchmaker territory. My guess is that a large chunk of that $11K price tag is going to pay the wages of the skilled craftsmen who are working on these machines.
On a bit of a tangent, somebody mentioned optical/laser turntables. ELP has been around for some forty years and sells in the $20k price range...
I myself came up with the idea of optically scanning the record groves, converting the scans into a 3D STL file and then using curve-fitting and in-filling to create a model of a pristine model of the grove that could then be played with digital audio software.
Turns out it’s been thought of, although the idea of 3D modeling is, as far as I know, original. For more information...
Awesome turntable with the parallel tone arm. I have the more pedestrian Technics direct drive of the era, that is a great one too. Just the high end us proles can afford.
After high school and on my first job I went to Dallas and bought a Dual 1229 turntable with a Shure V15 cartridge, Marantz 4440 quad receiver, and 4 Pioneer 3 way speakers. Bought a huge FM antenna from Radio Shack mounted it on the roof, aimed it at Dallas and I had KZEW (The Zoo) rocking.
For the first time in decades, vinyl records outsell compact discs
If you had told me a few years ago that records would ever outsell CDs I would have thought you were crazy.
I have a few hundred old country albums. I have no idea what they are worth.
I have all the vinyl I purchased since 1967 or so. Its how I like my sound and a great personal hobby with the anal retentive electronics and hi fidelity sound reproduction...yadda yadda, lava lamps and Oh, MAN, you should been there that night !!
The kids finally listened and got dad one of the best B-day presents ever. (Maybe I have something worth fighting over after all?) Brand new CNC machined aluminum turntable feet with Sorbathane vibration isolation built right in! And a fresh tube of vibration isolation dampening fluid for the tonearm drop solenoid. I apologies for not being able to join in on Eddie Van Halen's memorial play, but I will more than make up for it when the unit comes out of the maintenance repair yard.
I can see a lot of people who are stuck in the house and wanting to upgrade their systems. I upgraded my soundbar a couple of weeks ago because we no longer have the room for a complete system. My neighbor has already complained which means the new subwoofer is working well.
My first high-end turntable was a Dual 1218 w/Shure M91ED cartridge. I traded it for a Harmon-Kardon ST-7 with a Rabco straight-line arm that had glass colored "touch buttons" with a Sonus "Blue" cartridge.
Eventually. all that was traded for a Linn Sondek LP-12, Ittok tonearm & Supex 900e+ Super MC cartridge.
They figure the all the styluses around the country would be worn out by play Christmas music 24/7......................
Had that same idea myself as a young empty headed engineer...................
I bought a pair of Klipsch KG4s when I got married in 1985, and they outlasted at least three amps and every other component over the years. I gave them to my son a couple of years ago, and he can’t stop talking about them. Great American company and truly outstanding products!
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