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Wife prefers 401 and Shure 75ED to Linn

Continuing to make virtues out of vices and or necessity I fitted the homemade spikes to the leg blocks.

I presently feel this produced the effect of reducing air induced feedback and much of the floor feedback ... so revealing, I assume, more of the intrinsic sound of the deck ..... so much less rumble in general

The effect is to 'round off' the bass ..... minus the feedback/rumble I can hear the definition of the bass notes at the bottom of the range ...... will I loose my flat earth badge with this talk? ....

It occurs to me I may have met the limits of the Shure now sort of a shouting quality ... its too isolated in the relatively cleaned up sound and so its limits are clearer or in this reduced rumble situation it also has a veiled quality compared to newer carts .... with all this woodworking going on I am loathe to fit the Denon ..... I have an VMS30 somewhere, also with new needle ..... so I'll maybe do that tomorrow its a much cleaner sound and more transparent ...... pity there are no 78 rpm needles for it.

Ongoing bass revalations bass is clearly in a different league altogether from the Nirvan Valhalla level Linn and is really noticeable when listening from my office next door to the music room.

Looking at the Slatedeck site I liked the look of their slate and bronzy rega etc arm mounts ...... I hope they are available to those without the rest of their great plinth? As I research my plinth options I wonder if the arm mountin/raising blocks much in evidence on 301 & 401's are afixed to the baseplates or just resting? Slatedecks being massy (the slate ones) can just sit but most others are of wood ..... I cant see from most shots if they are fixed with screws.glue etc. What did you do Patrick when you had you rega in play?
Points of view welcome.
 
I bolted the Rega down. I had to use a 15mm spacer on top of the plinth, and counter bore the hole from the underside, to get the Rega to the right height and with enough exposed thread to get the nut on. I didn't do the nut up very tightly.

You could look at the VTAF idea (google for it), or the Michell VTA adjuster/nut for possible solutions, but a lot depends on your plinth material and how flexible you want the arm mounting arrangement to be.

I suspect that you are also hearing the Rega as well at the Shure BTW.
 
'I suspect that you are also hearing the Rega as well at the Shure BTW.'

Oh.

That hadnt occurred to me ...... I had hoped that by using a more uptodate arm than the original Sony SME clone I would have an easier time a-b ing with the Linn. Running out of .... what 'definition' or is it 'operating space' so soon ......'oi vey its still on the floor' and your telling me Ive hit the buffers already.

Hmmh ...... well I dont expect to need VTA adjustments once set up in place.

Thanks for the info re wether you bolted up the raiser ...... I too didnt do the big rega nut up beyond finger tight although when I removed it from its P3 it required a spanner.

I'll screw the raiser board in later and have another good listen...... but I wont move the Ittok until the plinth is more advanced.

The Linn is almost a shibboleth for me its given so much over the years so dismantling it will be a big deal for me ..... a sort of coming out of the church of Linn.

I heard a full on money no object total Linn system (well 3 of them actually in the same house) in a old chums house who I only see once a year or so. I was very puzzled by the Linn House sound. Essentially CD only and Sixpack power amps, power supplies etc etc. It sounded nothing like anything I recognised as 'my hifi' over the years.

I guess the LP12 is from a different era but if this is where Linn ended up givien a free hand with every component then I dont feel modernising the LP12 is going to do it for me.

I also appreciate the plug and play aspect of the Garrards. Albeit after all this plinthing about.
 
ian r said:
I had hoped that by using a more uptodate arm than the original Sony SME clone I would have an easier time a-b ing with the Linn. Running out of .... what 'definition' or is it 'operating space' so soon ......'oi vey its still on the floor' and your telling me Ive hit the buffers already.
Click to expand...
I'm not saying you've hit the buffers, my RB250 sounded much better after re-wiring and a new c/w, but I don't think it would have been a match for the Ekos2 that was on my LP12 (and I thought the Ekos2 was a decent step up from the Ittok LVII it replaced). It's only when you go to a better arm that you realise what the previous one was doing to the sound, and I think in retrospect, the RB250 does the dynamics fairly well, but conceals a lot of the midrange. It's pretty good for £150, but the Ekos2 was around £1800 new IIRC and you do get a bit more for your money. The Terminator however, is in a different league to both of them and only costs £500. It probably isn't practical on a Linn, but now you have a Garrard you owe it to yourself to hear it!
 
Speed is very stable and in the quite near the middle setting, as I run it longer the rumble seems to be diminishing so after the motor and spindle rebuild before Christmass perhaps a little use might have been helpful ...its only now getting some actual play. I havent found a record which has its own rumble on it yet ..... but I know I have some.

Re the buffers with the arm etc..... so far Im not sure the arm is good with complex music orchestral or layers of sound stuff in rock .... Led Zep 1 isnt much fun on it yet. Interesting ..... however on standard 'combos' its frankly absurd. I have no intention of faffing about with Linn upgrades and servicing.

The difference in delivery via the briks is also interesting ..... there is some imaging going on to the left and right of the speakers .... mostly in the bass ..but the cartridge isnt sophisticated enough to let me into that space ... however its a good party cartridge if I can find enough 50 year olds who are into loud music anymore!

The household and children begin to return today so I will have less opportunity to do loud listening but will attempt to seduce more ears into listening when possible.

As I read more and more about the r300 its not clear to me that chasing the nuances of a rewire are worth it .... unless i can do it myself. I once read the earth wire was the toughest bit ..... if someone has a low slung counterweight to lend for a week or so I'd be grateful .... although the Blue Peter approach of 'heres some strips of lead I formed around an old stub is possible' but not exactedly scientific .....I know no connections betwixt cartridge and amp is clearly going to lower impedance etc ...... are these rewire still leavng a robust set of cables that take wear and tear caused by moving the arm of and on the deck etc. The wires mentioned seem very thin .... are they robust for an active life.

We have a crawling baby not far of first steps and are having to redesign much of fittings etc so until this deck is finally installed it will have an active life.

Re the counterweight mod ....... lowering it is received wisdom but its not a pivot design so why does it improve matters?

Is it that that they are generally screwed on metal to metal, rather than the present Durex arrangements on the standard 300?
 
OK yesterday I removed the rubber bushes atop the 3 legs and returned to spikes. The sound with rubber (awaiting the squash balls from ebay) was more relaxed but less sharp than the spikes supporting the top plate.

Then I fitted dome headed screws x3 to each leg base ...so now its metal top and bottom with an element of levelling possible.

WOW

the bass is even more in focus now ..... which one would hardly know was possible anyway as it was already so much more defined than Linn bass .... so thats why I rather rate this all spiked approach approach and inshallah the final plinth will have this approach.

The purchase of the squash balls maybe a complete waste of time at this rate. The possibility to try ball bearings is tempting ... but I expect they would need to be at least an inch in diameter means a slight delay in locating them ..... I'll try a lorry mechanic I know.

The whole question of a lower plate is yet to be worked on.

At present its a ply top plate 3/4inch thick, resting on 3 top spiked really thick legs. Each of these individual legs has a tripod of dome headed screws in their base.

It maybe that where one places the tripod of legs has a clear effect. Joining the legs up in a frame like a snooker triangle would be convenient when moving etc ..... but keeping items separated is how its is at present ... Unlike Tony Im still curious about freestanding arm coloums.

If I get really anal about this then supporting the motor from below rather than its spring sling shouldnt be to hard to experiment with.

I feel this thread should start to combine with the Garrard Plinth design thread of Tony's, I never really expected it to be so easy to experiment with and thus need reporting on ..... is ending this and combining a good idea?
 
Any chance of some pics of where you are now with your plinth - it's pretty hard to visualise what you are doing exactly.

Tony.
 
Yes but no but. VERY ANNOYINGLY the vodafone dongle at 30/month we use to access the www pretends Im under 18 (I suspect as a covert bandwith limiter) and so when I try to access photobucket it aint doable ..... dont buy such a dongle without them committing to admitting you arent 18!

Anyway here goes links may follow ....... for the same reason I cant access most images on PFM or even eBay if on a notional suspect list of vodafone sites
 
Basic Top shot showing config. Its to be a 2 arm so plate is big at present:

DSC00079.jpg


Levelling and lower dome headed screws that make all the difference to bass pitch/definition
DSC00082.jpg


Shot of front leg with basic spike on top ..... this may not be the best place for this leg it was in front left corner for a while:
DSC00085.jpg



Slight close up of spiked front leg ..... all legs are freestanding on their tripods
DSC00080.jpg
 
I can see 'em all - I fixed a couple of links in your post earlier as you'd missed the '[' off the front of the IMG tags.

Tony.
 
Ian - any insight as to why you mounted your arm in the typical second arm position?

Conventional wisdom says that you want the arm as far away from the motor as possible (and hence part of the reason for a 12"er) to reduce rumble.
 
Ah Gortnipper its because I am expecting to have 2 arms .... and I have another base plate with the armhole in the conventional place. However because of the oft stated issues of rumble and magnetic interference I am checking that aspect out as the conventional place is not much of an issue. I will probably be using high output MC carts until a desirable low output falls into my lap and the 9inch arms are producing no issues for my ears so far.

I do believe i mention this 2 arm idea in an earlier post but suffer from the delusion that my previous posts have been read.

No insult intended.

Re rumble ....... there isnt any ...... there was when I began to seriously get into these experiments a fortnight ago which was 3-4 months after the motor strip and bearing clean etc that I did. I used a molyslip oil in the main bearing reassembling, I was given this oil by J7 at audiorigami.

The deck seemed to take 2-3 days of minimal use and long warm up to loose the deck rumble after the rebuild. What I did find is that it was happier everytime I gave it an extra set of spikes (ie top and then later bottom ... the rubber bushes didnt appeal so much but were easier on the ear) ... and its basic noise threshold whilst different from the Linn is ..... can I say 'more interesting'.

I have heard the phrase inky blackness in the past and the 'sound signature'
( frustrated poet and writer alert!) of the 401 is simply more exciting than the Linn (not up to date model but mine from new) ....... and in a way more alarming .... Anyway as you can see Im listening hard and there is no audible rumble BUT I wil be doing another matchbox test ....... when I find my matchbox ........ which are much more difficult to locate these days ......
 
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