£200-300 Turntables - am I expecting too much ?

The cracked capacitor sounds encouraging, they run erratically or even backwards when they're knackered.

Andy
Ooh, at least mine's not going backwards yet ;)

While I wait to replace the cap... After lubing the bearing, if I remove the belt and spin the platter by hand, it keeps going for around 1m 15s, so I think that's fine.
 
£ for £ under £1000 a vinyl player probably offers the worse sound of any medium.
I'm not going to agree or disagree, but just offer some tangential thoughts. I have three sources...

* LP: Rega Planar 3, 1979 vintage (currently having speed problems). Currently have an Audio Technica AT95E (and wish I had the cash for the equivalent of the Ultimo 10X I originally had with it). A modern RP3 would cost, what, about £550?

* CD: Audiolab 8000CD. This uses old-style ladder DACs with their inherent problems with low-level signals, but it has two Burr-Brown chips which were well respected in their day. I bought this second hand for around £300 some years ago.

* Streaming: Mac Mini (older version for ~£100) as a dedicated music server, which I can route multiple ways into an upsampling Cambridge Audio DacMagic Plus (about £300 new), usually via a Squeezebox duet receiver (can't remember new price, about £45 used), or via USB.

Is my LP source clearly the worst of the three? No. Is my modern streaming source clearly better than my outdated CD player? No.

They're all different, for sure. But there's something I love about the sound of that old Audiolab CD player, which I don't get from my more modern streaming source.

And I have some old favourites that, to me, definitely sound better from LPs played on my old Rega. I also have some on LP, CD, and digital file, and sometimes I like to listen to one and sometimes another.

I say forget trying to decide which is best, just enjoy each for what it is.
 
Check that the drive pulley is firmly attached to the motor spindle. Loads of these get loose with age, and are just held with a tiny drop of super glue. Failing that the usual centre bearing lube might help. After that, there are only two components on the circuit board, a capacitor and a resistor. Either of those failing will cause issues and are really easy and cheap to replace. Most people don't though, and presume the motor has gone, but that is surprisingly rare.

Andy
Just to update...

I pulled out the cap, and saw that it's a mess of cracks all round. It's one of those old Rifa paper caps in a yellow plastic casing and, well, I think it would be a little unfair to expect it to have lasted 40 years ;)

It's marked 0.22uF (250V~), and I measured it just out of curiosity and it came out at 0.32uF... but kept flipping to zero. So it's obviously shorted. I've replaced it with a 0.22uF polyester (305V~).

While I was there, I noticed the motor suspension belt was looking a bit ragged, and the rubber on the feet was starting to harden, so I replaced those too.

It's all back together now, and playing great :) Tonally it's defintely better too - particularly noticeable in the upper bass, which is cleaner and more defined now where it used to be a bit woolly.

Anyway, with new lube and new drive belt too, I reckon it's good for a few more years now.

So thanks, Andy, for the tips.

Alan
 
Just to update...

I pulled out the cap, and saw that it's a mess of cracks all round. It's one of those old Rifa paper caps in a yellow plastic casing and, well, I think it would be a little unfair to expect it to have lasted 40 years ;)

It's marked 0.22uF (250V~), and I measured it just out of curiosity and it came out at 0.32uF... but kept flipping to zero. So it's obviously shorted. I've replaced it with a 0.22uF polyester (305V~).

While I was there, I noticed the motor suspension belt was looking a bit ragged, and the rubber on the feet was starting to harden, so I replaced those too.

It's all back together now, and playing great :) Tonally it's defintely better too - particularly noticeable in the upper bass, which is cleaner and more defined now where it used to be a bit woolly.

Anyway, with new lube and new drive belt too, I reckon it's good for a few more years now.

So thanks, Andy, for the tips.

Alan

Brilliant! Glad it worked. You can keep those turntables going forever because they are so simple.

Andy
 

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