Romy the Cat wrote:

In your “G” configuration the motor takes the place of one or two back tonearms that are very comfortable to use.  One of the objectives for this project is that I have a functional need to put more tonearm/cartridges into a simultaneous use.

Wojtek wrote:

A magnetic tape (VCR) seems to be in fashion in some circles ,as a rubber belt replacement .Doesn't stretch like rubber and you can glue the required lenght as you wish .Custom motor pulley is required

This is big colt issue in the TT world: the driving a TT with reel-to-reel tape (not VCR).

I do not know, I always have difficulties to talk with audio people about those subjects. They seems to have very strong and very definitive position how different driving tool affect sound of their timbales. The most confident and vocal of them claim that driving belt hugely affect the performance of this TT. Those people use dead and LF restricted loudspeakers, disabled phonostages and very quite irrational sound in there listening rooms but still they state the DC supply for this TT motors, NASSA designed TT belt with servo circuit of belt tension monitoring is something that “hugely improves the performance of analog gear”. What a ridicules audio freakanization!

I drove my TTs with fabric threads, fishing lines, reel-to-reel tape, dental floss, nylon belts and whatever else I was able to find. All of them act differently on platter; all of them have different tensions, different slippage, and in a very microscopic and negligible way affect the micro-stability of the platters momentum. However, do they SPOUND different in context of the perforce of entire TT? I really do not think so, as least I was not able to detect it. Even if you place your motor 3 feet away, drive platter with a long reel-to-reel tape, and clearly hear that the tape ‘sings” then this very objective and very undesirable noise has completely no effect to sound coming from loudspeakers. (at least in context of Micro Seiki 8000’s platters).

So what does it means that “a magnetic tape (VCR) seems to be in fashion”? I really do not know… probably it has to do something with ....“fashion".

Rgs,
Romy the Cat

Romy the Cat wrote:

I do not know, I always have difficulties to talk with audio people about those subjects. They seems to have very strong and very definitive position how different driving tool affect sound of their timbales. The most confident and vocal of them claim that driving belt hugely affect the performance of this TT. Those people use dead and LF restricted loudspeakers, disabled phonostages and very quite irrational sound in there listening rooms but still they state the DC supply for this TT motors, NASSA designed TT belt with servo circuit of belt tension monitoring is something that “hugely improves the performance of analog gear”. What a ridicules audio freakanization! I drove my TTs with fabric threads, fishing lines, reel-to-reel tape, dental floss, nylon belts and whatever else I was able to find. All of them act differently on platter; all of them have different tensions, different slippage, and in a very microscopic and negligible way affect the micro-stability of the platters momentum. However, do they SPOUND different in context of the perforce of entire TT? I really do not think so, as least I was not able to detect it. Even if you place your motor 3 feet away, drive platter with a long reel-to-reel tape, and clearly hear that the tape ‘sings” then this very objective and very undesirable noise has completely no effect to sound coming from loudspeakers. (at least in context of Micro Seiki 8000’s platters).

TonyB wrote:

I disagree. I think it depends on the turntable. If I did not try it on MY turntable, I would not believe. My Verdier uses a DC motor "sloppy" mounted on grommets. The drive is linen thread. I have tried silk, different threads, 1/4" mag tape, different 1/2" tapes, another pulley and fixed motor mounting. Each of them sounded different and in the end I preferred the original "sloppy" mounted motor with the linen thread. I came to a conclusion that Jean-Constant Verdier did his homework before he started shipping his turntables. Please do not forget that Verdier is a suspended table. Speaking with my friends, I have no doubt that their Galigier and Teres tables without suspension work better with 1/2" tape. But their motors, pods and tables are different from mine. And what works for them, does not work for me.

Tony, this was exactly the pint of my thread: The Foolishness of Analog People

http://www.goodsoundclub.com/TreeItem.aspx?postID=2002

the faulty design objective and faulty criteria create the faulty arrays of “know-hows” to deal with the faults. The belt and platter is essentially, in its mechanic equivalent, is a second order filter. I remember a few years ago Lexhnitsky wrote in one of the magazines the mathematic of this processes. However, what people loosing when they observe the belt-platter relation is that if the momentum of the platter is very high and the compliance of belt is very low then the mechanical filter become absolutely negligible. Would you consider that a combination with 5 Farad capacitor and .001 mH coil being a second order filter? Anyhow, I do presume that with light (still the Verdier is not particularly light), suspended turntables and with the belt/thread applied unreasonably hard the belt would meter. From one perspective, yes, if we look at the Teres or Clearaudio or to many others then they “change sound” even if my Cat farts in a listening room. However, I am convinced that with a properly made TT the effect of loosely applied belt would, not be auditable. I personally do not believe that it would be auditable even in the light TT. Call me “being in denial”.

TonyB wrote:

Similar could be said about AC vs. DC motor power. A lot of people say that battery DC power sounds better or a certain DC voltage speed controller is better. I have tried at least 3 different batteries and AC is still better in my system. The batteries made sound dead for me. The same went for the speed adjustment. I have made some high performance speed controllers, including load-compensating type. In the end, I preferred the basic regulator. (Well, it was completely rebuilt.) It is possible that I did not do everything right in the other controllers, since things like a DC supply cable make a difference (this is from my personal experience). I still have a couple of tricks in my sleeve for the DC power and the speed controller. It is a no expense spared approach but I wonder whether in the end it will be worth those $700 spent. I will know in a few weeks...

I really do not know what to say, Tony. Spending efforts for decoupling a motor from a TT and then to claim that the supply of the motor “sounds better” is really beyond my understanding. I would understand when people use bad motors that dispense some kind of magnetic fields around themselves, heat or vibration that shake the entire building. I understand the issues with electoral part of motors (thermo stability at low speed and so on…)  but I really do not know how it all might relate to Sound if the belt/platter decoupling is made responsibly good.

guy sergeant wrote:

Is this the kind of set up you're contemplating?

guy sergeant wrote:

Your first law of upgrading usually seems to be "identify what dissatisfies you in your playback before you try to change things" or something like that. Very sensible advice. What is it about the sound of your existing TT that prompts you to want to change it?  Do you perceive some lack of stability, constancy, perhaps some tonal aberration or is it just its performance compared with your FM that has brought on this urge for improvement?

guy sergeant wrote:

Sorry, I have a better understanding of the purpose of this exercise now. Are you making 2 new platters or is one to be the existing Micro Platter?

Nope, juts adding RX-5000 platter and base to the existing RX-8000

guy sergeant wrote:

Given that your RX 8000 appears to have a platter made of phosphor bronze (gunmetal) what is your second platter going to be made of? (I understood from some research that Micro felt the phosphor bronze platters better lent themselves to use with SS electronics)

The very same “yellow” platter. The “tone” of the platter is irrelevant. The “tone” becomes relevant if you play vacuum hold-down (MKII) and a record sits atop of the “bare” platter, or atop of a platter decoupled with a very thin fabric. I do not like vacuum hold-down and in my case the platters employ quite thick TT mats that make the platter’s tone irrelevant.

guy sergeant wrote:

How is the phono stage being revised? Are you planning for different eq settings for various vintage recordings?  Will all of your cartridges still be loaded via the ET2?

I would not comment on it at this point in depth. Very basically I would be an offensive design where a “correct” phonostage and ET2 will be working against all 4-6 tonearms, without any switching of cable, adjustment of loading and so on….  Cruelty the revision is in a progress and if I turn out to be successful then I will post information about it

Rgs,
Romy the caT

Antonio J. wrote:

Which one? Where can I find it? how much is it? What's it made of? I've tried a few mats and I always found in all of them some added "colorature". I've not tried any of the "audiophile approved" ones since I didn't expect any of them to work, and they're not inexpensive either, but maybe it's time to change my mind.

I do not know, Antonio. I tried very few "audiophile approved" mats and they were too much “Fremery” to me: means showy but with not substance. I have a few mats (or perhaps now is just one left) that picked quite long time ago from some TTs of 70s and that work perfectly fine. I have no idea what they are and where I can get them. They are most likely rubber-made but have a very high density. They feel mode feel like metal or plastic then rubber. They are a approximately few mm high, rather on a thick side, weight a couple of pounds and as far as I concern do Sonically whatever is necessary. I do not know what quality a TT’s mat should have by being sandwiched with my platter it “sounds” very nice, at least I can’t identify anything wrong - platter related. I have also, and sometime used a parabolic mat (along with my parabolic add-in platter) but it requires using a heavy center-poll weight (clamp). I do not like the center-poll clamp and therefore I tend do not run the parabolic top.

Rgs,
Romy the Cat

To Antonio,

it is not necessary to “to find some mat with those characteristics of yours”. The characteristics of mat would be applicable only I context of the TT you use (platter, suspension and so on). With my Micro 8000 that has very dead sounding platter to begin with, I really do not need mat to do anything\ and the very hard rubber TT mars do very well for me. Older Technics turntables employed wonderfully-hard mat, some Micro Seiki mat were nicely hard (actually Micro did some stuff for Technics and at the time they share some product lines). Nakamichi did some very cool, hard and heavy mats. I mean the hard rubber it was the better it would be…. but only in “my case”. If you have a light platter with own sound (most of them do) then the composition and density of the TT mat might be different. Once again - it all should be view in context of entire TT setting (type of patter, existence of clap, shape of the mat, TT topology and many other things)  and it should not be juts blindly imitates. Still, I would stay with rubber mats of different density and would not go for any carbon, plastic, subroutine or any other “invention type” of mats.

To the rest folks.

Ok, I did some initial experiments with my Micro Seiki double deck projects.

I spent entire day to move the motors, platters, arms around. It was not always possible to get out the arrangement exactly what I wanted as other then sound considerations dictated what to do (access to the given arm, layout of the cables form the tonearms, the location of the phonostages, the length of arm boards, and many other things). In the end I find that the locations of motor do not affect sound as much as tension of the belt between the platters. I was not able to use two-belts approach as I have no means to maintain the height of the belt between the platters (I would need an idle roll to do so). So, I stack to a single belt of 87” so far.

The final layout that I ended up with largely die to my recent thoughts about my phonostages – I am planning to use juts one phonostages (I will most likely writhe about I future). Therefore, the accessibility to the 6 inputs of my single phonstages and the phonostages position become quite imperative factor.

Above the image now I ended up so far. The phonostages sits between

Above the image now I ended up so far. The phonostages sits between the motor and the TT’s platters. The TT platters together sit atop of a Vibraplane. It kind of all-together comfy to use and I did not detect any problem with sound so far. The middle platter, that presumably should be in heavy “slipping mode”, works juts fine with none measurable speed deviation. For a time being I use tahe magnetic tape but will be ordering a thin and light rubber belts if I settle with this configuration for good.

Rgs,
Romy the Cat

Antonio J. wrote:

Dear Romy, thanks for your comment. I actually don't want the mat to do "something" for me sonically, but to teach me how far I'm I of my ideal. Knowing your goals and taking for granted that the 8000's platter must be rather dead sonically, I assume those mats must be quite dead also. The purpose to use some sonically dead mat is to learn if the platter I'm using now is as dead as I'm supposing (it's quite high mass at 20Kg and the surface is a carbon composite layer weighing about 5Kg). I don't use any clamp (it doesn't work as good as clamps worked on the old TT) and the plynth is not suspended. The "a priori" approach is that a dead mat would eliminate or at least "damp" some sound from the platter, but as you point, maybe the platter has some kind of sound that helps in the results I'd like to get, so in my context, it would be better not to use any mat. I'll have to check it.

I do not think that anyone would be able to “teach” and I do not thin that there is nothing to teach about the mats. A good “sounding” platter does not require any “actions” from mat and the hard rubber mats do exactly this. In fact if a platter is god then you can play a record right atop of it and it should have near the same sound as with a hard rubber mat. The problems begins what the platters sound “strange” then we begin coming up with all imaginable stupid means to get “correct sound” out of the platter buttering the platter with mats or with other bogus sound-shaping means. For instance I was very surprised recently that Micro RX-5000 has in fact quite colored platter sound. I had two RX-5000s and I did not remember any negative feelings about it. However, the one RX-5000 that I fished recently has very ringy platter. After servicing the RX-5000 and setting it up I had to figure out how to make it sound neutral. I ended up with layering a thin layer of sorbotan atop of the platter and then cover it with thick hard rubber mat. It works so far fine but I am not sure that it will be the final solution.

Antonio J. wrote:

I hope you keep us posted on your findings. Which is the heavier platter? Did you find any interesting difference in placing one TT closer to the motor than the other? Are you planning to try the 3012 on the other TT? I'll be glad knowing what combination of tonearm and stereo cartridge in that setup works for the highest dynamic contrast, I don't mean to sound louder at fffff but having more intermediate steps beween ppp and ffff. That's something that lately is obsessing me. I find my vinyl quite acceptable tonally (for my taste and exigence which probably are at a different level than yours) but I'd like it to be more "colorful" dynamically. I hope I've explained myself.

The heaviest platter is on the right, having more contact surface with the belt. So far everything is more or less OK, besides the DC motor have more work to do, suck more current form PS and head the transformer more it would like to be heated. More "colorful" dynamically? Why do you feel that it has anything to do with combination of tonearm and a cartridge?

Rgs,
Romy the Cat

Romy the Cat wrote:

I do not think that anyone would be able to “teach” and I do not thin that there is nothing to teach about the mats. A good “sounding” platter does not require any “actions” from mat and the hard rubber mats do exactly this. In fact if a platter is god then you can play a record right atop of it and it should have near the same sound as with a hard rubber mat. The problems begins what the platters sound “strange” then we begin coming up with all imaginable stupid means to get “correct sound” out of the platter buttering the platter with mats or with other bogus sound-shaping means. For instance I was very surprised recently that Micro RX-5000 has in fact quite colored platter sound. I had two RX-5000s and I did not remember any negative feelings about it. However, the one RX-5000 that I fished recently has very ringy platter. After servicing the RX-5000 and setting it up I had to figure out how to make it sound neutral. I ended up with layering a thin layer of sorbotan atop of the platter and then cover it with thick hard rubber mat. It works so far fine but I am not sure that it will be the final solution.

Romy the Cat wrote:

The heaviest platter is on the right, having more contact surface with the belt. So far everything is more or less OK, besides the DC motor have more work to do, suck more current form PS and head the transformer more it would like to be heated. More "colorful" dynamically? Why do you feel that it has anything to do with combination of tonearm and a cartridge? Rgs, Romy the Cat

Antonio J. wrote:

Well, I don't know if there's something wrong with the platter and I'd like to know it. All I know is that lower bass has kind of "detachement" from the mid-upper bass, that I don't hear from the tuner nor the DAC.

If it doe not happen on all recording but only on foe ten flipping of ability polarity switch would help. If it happens with all recordings then time-align the LF channel, reduces it at minus 2-3dB and forces yourself to listen at bass-reduced level for a direction of at least 2-3 weeks. What it boils down that some of the bad LF sections (I do not know what you use BTW) raise acoustic pressure of LF in a room faster then the rise tonal pressure… Your problems defiantly might be due to many other reasons but I would start from that I have mentioned and analog gave the most demanding bass among all other sources.

Antonio J. wrote:

It's not that I want to find a most-dynamic cart-tonearm combo, but to know which is in your opinion, of your current carts and tonearms, the pair that dynamically is performing better, and if any, what are the trade offs you find. I suppose that there's no perfect combination and possibly you end up liking some combination for some precise record, and other one for a different disc, but in spite of that, it could happen that you found some pairing specially good from the dynamics point of view. It's possible too that my former observations were wrong and the "righter" music I perceived had nothing to do with dynamics. To me it's very difficult to correlate music and the way I interact with it and the "sonics", although I can detect a wrong sonic performance. At least I get acceptable music, which is way more than I was able two years ago ;-)

Hm… yes and no. I do not match cartridges with tonearms to a large degree. Peaty much if I could (and probably I should) I would have all my 6 tonearms presented with six 3012 of higher affective mass. My arms more have functional separation then matching. Anyhow, my “references tonearm” with witch I play good and cleaned stereo records of general music is 3012R with 18G in headshell paired with Shelter 901

Rgs,
Romy