It Live's!!

[Patrick Dixon]

I lifted the platter and the squash balls were coloured black.

I think you'll find they all are, but they should have a little coloured spot on them somewhere too. The yellow spot one's don't bounce at all until they get really warmed up, the others require less warm-up. You probably should have different ones for summer and winter, and for hot and cold climes. Who said 401s don't need tweeking? Sell yours NOW before the market crash

[Markus S]

IIRC Garrard use yellow dot squash balls.

[Paul Dimaline]

Ok, time for an update.

Spent a very usefull 10 minutes talking with Terry at Lorricraft the other day and he put my mind at rest on a number of things. Told me to go buy some sewing machine or gun oil, so I did for the grand old sum of £2.15.
He was very forthcoming with advice, I get the distinct impresion he doesnt need any more work! Anyway it seems the bottom motor bearing cant be oiled without stripping the motor down. All the other bearings can be got at by just removing the platter, but as the motor on my deck seemed quite noisey and the main bearing was bone dry I thought it quite important to address the matter. So, for those wishing to give it a go heres how I did mine.

There is no need to remove any wireing. Remove the screw that holds the eddy curent dial and lift of the actuating arm. Remove the 3 screws that hold the motor yoke to the chassis and carefully juggle the motor away from the chassis, making sure to jiggle the eddy current actuating arm from underneath the wireing. There is enough slack in the wireing to lay the motor assembly on the workbench.
A circlip holds the eddy current magnet to the motor case, remove this and put to one side.
There is a collar with 3 screws that secures the pulley to the motor shaft, slacken the screws and remove the pulley. There are now 3 more screws that hold the eddy current rotor, again slacken and remove.
You will now see 2 small nuts that hold the motor caseings together, but first the 3 suspention springs will need to be unhooked to enable the motor cases to be seperated. These are held in place by a circlip, you will need some long nosed pliers to remove these as space is tight. When all 3 are unhooked remove the 2 nuts holding the case together, I again used long nosed pliers as they are recesed in the case. Lift of the motor case and that will reveal the rotor, lift this out and disasembly is complete.
You can now see the bottom bearing. Put 5 drops of oil in the bearing and replace the rotor, this will force the oil into the felt pads that feed the bearing, repeat this half a dozen times to load the felt pads with oil.
The bearings are of the self centering type, so I put one drop of oil on the bearing housing to aid reasembly. The top bearing can be oiled without disasembly, access is trough the 3 holes in the eddy current rotor.
The self aligning bearings can apparently be difficult to align sometimes, if this is the case, when assembly is complete, run the motor without the pulley and lightly tap the spindle with the handle of a small screwdriver. My bearings went together with no trouble.
Assembly is simply a reversal of dissasembly, getting the suspention springs back in place is fun!

One of my main concerns with the deck when I got it up and running was the motor noise. I pleased to report that now the motor has been recharged with oil it sounds alot quieter. The speed adjuster dial has had to be adjusted a little as the newly oiled deck was running slightly faster than before. The most suprising thing is that the sound of the deck has taken a huge leap forwards, being much cleaner and less muddled in the midrange. All in, a good evenings work and quite straight forward to do if a little fiddly in places.

I've also started work on the Lorricraft type plinth. Keeping in mind I have never seen a Lorricraft plinth in the flesh, so I am only guessing the design from what bits of info I have gathered. I have mitred and glued up the surround and have cut out a new top board. All I can predict at the moment is that it is going to be very, very big. It is looking nice however. More info to come when its finished.

Paul.

[Paul Dimaline]

Never posted an image before, so dont be surprised if this dosnt work![IMG][/IMG]

[Paul Dimaline]

Gosh, wonders never cease!
As you can see above i've got the working prototype finished. The British Racing Green paintwork is a bit lurid and the Walnut, once planed up was very disapointing. Still. it will do for a while untill I get around to building the final version.
I'll get back to the computer and sort out some more photos of it being made..

Paul.

[Robert]

Looks fantastic!

Great job you've done there and the grass sets it off nicely

If that is a prototype then I for one an eagerly looking forward to some pics of the the finished item.

Rob.

[sideshowbob]

From that photo, I think it looks great.

-- Ian

[Paul Dimaline]

Ok, as a picture paints a thousand words the construction of the plinth is pretty self explanatary. First photo shows the Walnut mitred and glued together with all the bracing in place.


[IMG][/IMG]


Next is the top plate and the armboard. The armboard is upsidedown, the recess is for the mounting nut for the RB300. There are 3 clearance holes in the armboard recess and the armboard is decoupled from the top plate by a rubber gasket made from a old innertube. The screws are inserted from underneath and are also decoupled with rubber tap washers. It works well but is not a very accurate meathod of possitioning the arm, I need to work on this further.


[IMG][/IMG]


Finally a close up of the corner bracing showing the squash balls that are used to support the top plate. One problem I have is the top plate settling due to the weight of the motor unit. I will need to look into this also for the final version.

Soundwise I am chuffed to bits with the Garrard. It sounds weighty with a wonderfully deep and clean bass but seems very nimble with it. Not at all what I would expect a 30 or 40 year old turntable to sound. It realy desrves more than the £22 Ortofon MM its got at the moment!
For the final version I will look out for a nice bit of mt favourite timber, English Elm. The top plate will be covered in leather and as already stated a more accurate armboard system needs developing.

Paul.
[IMG][/IMG]

[B GIBBONS BEARD]

congratulations Paul , your record player looks fantastic..........so much so i have decided to hold on to mine and follow suit !

are you interested in seling your prototype plinth ?

regards BB

[Paul Dimaline]

Another veiw of the finished article giving a better veiw of the decoupled armboard. The recess in the top plate was achieved by cutting a 3-1/2" hole in a piece of 6mm mdf and then glueing that to the 18mm birch ply top plate.





Paul.

[Peter Stockwell]

Paul,

beautiful job!

Peter