My TT gained eight pounds today

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kach22i

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It took a crow bar plus a pry bar to lift the platter off the sub-platter. About ten years ago I joined them with Blu-Tack. Don't ever do this, yes a sonic improvement but a bit tough on the bearing when you go to change the belt out.

It was a little empty looking in there and the plastic sub-platter still a bit wanting design wise. This time I used Duct Seal, not as sticky as Blu-Tack but also remains elastic over time.

Where I could I added mass to the underside of the platter. When start it now, I help it get going with a little push.

I also filled up the plinth (eight bars), which connected (maybe not my best idea, but it's working out so far) the plinth top and plinth bottom (original design - see figure).

I sort of got the inspiration from here:
http://www.tnt-audio.com/clinica/td125tweaks.html

My TT suspension section in PDF:
http://www.dual-reference.com/Adverts/cs503-1.pdf

I put synthetic motor oil on all the moving parts using a pipe cleaner dipped in the oil container. The motor is silent now, it was audible before.

DUCTSEAL1.jpg

DUCTSEAL2.jpg


What's it sound like?

Pros; More bass, better bass, deeper bass. Deeper stage, with more depth. The sound is fuller, throatier and bit lower pitched. For example Julie London's debut LP (w/Cry me a river) sounds like she's a woman not a girl. Julie London sounds more like Holly Cole now if that makes sense. I'm beginning to wonder what she is supposed to sound like. She is more natural and modern sounding now, not so archaic or AM-like. More punch and slam, voices project more and are better seated (not on speaker, located in center) in the sound stage.

Con's; More surface noise, not a lot more but I noticed it right way on some older used LP's.

Unknowns; My new belt is not in yet, so the pitch and rhythm problems I had developing (stretched and old belt) may still be lurking, I'm holding on those comments for now. Most music does not sound fast or rushed, not really slow either.

I got so excited by all the new bass information that I hooked up my subwoofer (second set of preamp outs to sub with RCA interconnects).

Test LP's;
Julie London, Julie is her name
Colourbox, Colourbox
Pink Floyd, Dark Side of the Moon
Emerson Lake & Palmer, Lucky Man (the song's ending is awesome)

I have a few CD's which have almost too much deep bass. They set the max limit for the subwoofer. I turned down the bass a few notches while playing these.

Test CD's;
Holly Cole, Temptation
Finn Brothers, Finn

FM:
Some commercials have enormous amounts of bass in them, at least now I notice it more.

EDIT/UPDATE: 10/18/2009
I managed to lower the surface noise levels back down to where I remembered them. In the past I had Blu-Tack all over the sub-platter and it actually rode on top of this elastic bonding agent.

The Duct Seal which I was careful not to build it up too high was applied to allow the platter to ride on the first one inch of the subplatter and the outer raised plastic ridge ring. This hard surface to hard surface connection allowed more surface noise to reach my ears.

I placed a very thin layer of Duct Seal on the first one inch of raise aluminum found on the underside of the platter near the bearing spindle. I think this not only attenuated the energy transfer frequency but solved an imperfection in the design/manufacture of the system. The design flaw is a metal wire spring clip which squeezes the spindle.

The wire clip legs rest on the underside of the platter positioned in several shallow drilled out wells. These wells are not quite deep enough on one of the wires making that wire the first contact point of the whole connection system. The applied Duct Seal levels this one inch pad area around the spindle so the raised point is no more.
 
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