Building high-end 'tables cheap at Home Despot II

Holy Crap, Jimmy Neutron indeed!! I'll stick to something easy, like the Intergalactic Spaceship I'm building using a television screen as protection against meteorite strikes (NOT LCD, as those screens aren't unbreakable like the old-fashioned TV screens are) on the body of the spacecraft, a Volkswagon Beetle (air tight), a microwave oven and an air-ionizer, which I'll convert into an ion-thrust engine. The only problem is getting the thing into space, so I plan to sneak onto NASA's cape Canaveral and duct-tape my spacecraft to the exterior of the next launch unit during the night. My plan being, to accelerate to a large fraction of the speed of light once free of Earth's gravitational field, then return to Earth in the future to start a re-examination of the concept of Progress using vintage audio, assuming humanity is still able to speak at that future point, as writing is already on the way out (as I discovered when in written contact with the isurance section of Purolator, a shipping agency which had lost an item and refused fair compensation by sticking to the fine print: avoid avoid Wil Robinson!!!), and television ain't doing us any favours. But keep us posted as to your progress Mario, we'll watch in awe from afar!!

Over here I am restoring a local fellow's Lenco L70 (my first one!!) with the Dreaded Plastic Wheel. The complaint being "It's noisy". Yes, noisy as Hell: I could hear it down the hall through the closed door of my bedroom as I left it to run overnight after cleaning and relubricating main bearing, motor, and idler-wheel bearing. The wheel was straight with no flat spots, it had simply hardened over the years. Nothing helped, not soaking in liquid detergent, not lacquer thinner, not Rubber Renew. But being such a noisy beast it provided me a chance to re-experiment; like tuning a motor by deliberately leaving it on a hard surface exaggerate/amplify the noise in order to bring it down to a minimum. I noticed that simply by placing my hand on the top-plate the noise reduced considerably in volume. Extrapolating from this we can see how effective damping materials applied to the top-plate are in reducing noise, and if so for a noisy Lenco, then so for an already-quiet Lenco, allowing fine details to be more easily heard. The Lenco was sitting loosely in my old Blue Bomber Direct Coupling plinth. I noticed that by pressing down so the bottom of the top-plate contacted the "shims"/cut-out/second Coupling layer, the noise reduced even further. I stood on the Lenco top-plate while it was playing (yes, I know, don't believe the deliberate and misleading exaggerations of the Lenco "weaknesses", it withstood my full weight without a problem), and the noise reduced even further, showing that direct coupling DOES reduce noise considerably, and if so much for a very loud noisy Lenco, then what is it doing for an already quiet Lenco? Extrapolating, we can understand that the difference is likely of the same magnitude, the already inaudible noise-floor dropping even further to allow yet more information to emerge from the grooves and a deep-black background (not digital-black with no - CHOKE! - air, but analogue black where the air of a venue becomes more and more audible). Finally, I threw a simple rubber mat on the platter and the noise was again audibly reduced, and so extrapolating once again, we can see how gluing a rubber mat to the platter will be even more effective.

I had another plastic wheel left over from old days, and I tested it by feel, and it seemed to me that it was ever-so-slightly softer and more pliant than plastic wheel #1, so slightly in fact that it seemed it could be my imagination. Nevertheless, I removed wheel #1, and cleaned and re-lubed wheel #2 and dropped it in. The noise, with the accumulation of all these steps, was now completely gone, showing that after all plastic wheels can be made to be decent. It also shows that different plastic wheels had different formulations. Next step is to have the plastic wheels re-rubbered and ground in Missouri I believe it is, to see just how far I can take a plastic wheel. Lencos are getting scarce, and we can no longer afford to chuck aside the plastic wheels!!

Anyway, I'm thankful for the chance to work on this problematic L70, which was like taking a crash course/re-cap of all we have been doing since the beginning!! Refreshing to get a noisy one and hear so clearly what each step brings!! The fellow will be astonished when he claps ears on his Lenco now! I'm also applying what came so clear to me with the L70 to the Garrard 301 I am rebuilding, a brainstorm hitting immediately afterwards leading to a re-design of the plinth and the mounting arrangement.

Anyway, now it's back to my own Lenco, enjoy your idler-wheels all!!

An easy way to attach armboards
Two threaded neodymium magnets per board. It snaps like glue to the top plate.

Quick 'n' dirty L75 on magnet pillars

The 2-armed skeleton Lenco

Boy, it's been dead around here :-).

Just a quick note about the original Lenco arm, in case anyone is still using it instead of tossing it in the trash. In Stereophile Vol. 2, they published a reprint of an article from Hi Fi Sound (British) which tested 12 tonearms including the Lenco L-75, Ortofon RE-212, SME 3009-II and Sony PUA-237.

The Lenco arm had an effective mass of 23 grams with a 14 gm headshell.

By comparison, the effective masses of other arms:

Ortofon - 17 gm using the light 1 gm mounting plate in an 8 gm headshell

SME - 10 gm, 5.5 gm perforated headshell

Sony - 28 gm, 10 gm headshell plus 8 gm weight to balance it for a 7 gm cartridge.

Now THAT is skeletal Ronnie!! Reminds me of my first Lenco set-up, when I had no tools and no plans and the Lenco was sitting on stilts (that model, an L75, had usable metal stilts for some reason) with the Rega RB300. Even over a budget NAD 3020i/Boston A40 MKII system I heard details from my records I had never heard before, and with more musical intensity to boot. And this in comparison to both Maplenoll and Audiomeca turntables.

Great info for the Lenco archives Jim, keep'em coming.

Up here I'm still in the process of rebuilding my Garrard 301 grease-bearing, a big job!! But almost done, and hope to be hearing first notes very soon. Been playing with a variety of tonearms, have to say the Dynavector 507 MKII is perhaps the best I've heard (but the RS Labs may match it overall, but not for bass, have to listen some more), and it's not just audiophile niceties the Dyna excels in, it is also incredible at PRaT and gestalt, and an amazing match for the venerable Denon DL-103s. Too bad I can't afford one. Also playing with a Morch UP-4 unipivot, which is very light on its feet and ultra-detailed, reminds me very much of the Mayware, if better-behaved. And in spite of all these great tonearms, or perhaps because of it, my admiration for the Rega RB-300 just continues to grow as even in this august company (and including my experience with the SME V), the Rega holds its head up high. Likely due to its ultimate rigidity and simplicity (no rattly bits), even more rigid than the SME V (bolting arrangement simpler and stronger, no convenient doodads attached, etc.), the Rega has a PRESENCE, or palpability, none of the other tonearms so far have matched. In addition, in terms of detail, provided it has been re-wired, it is very close to the best, as it is in the bass and overall dynamics. The Dyna sets the standard here, but the Rega is not crushed. And, as if this weren't enough, the Rega is musical and easy to set-up!! I'll always have one anyway.

Which brings me to a phrase I always hear about various components, which ties in in turn to the history of audio. The old phrase "Poor Man's..." Now, I always heard that the Denon DL-103 is a Poor Man's Koetsu: it is no such thing. The Denon is superior in drive, PRAT and gestalt to any Koetsu; the Koetsu is superior in the purely audiophile areas of detail, frequency extension and imaging. This goes possibly for every single MC ever made, though the Dynavector 17D MKIII might stand a chance and the Ortofon SPUs. Since making music is the Prime Directive for any audio component, this places the venerable Denon DL-103s at the top of the heap, which is why they're venerable, in spite of being constantly damned with faint praise (many know better).

So how does it get the reputation of being a Poor Man's Koetsu? Because those who listen and write this choose to ignore the superior PRaT, drive and gestalt of the Denon and focus exclusively on detail and such-like (AND price), the great sickness /obsession of modern audio/audiophiles. Similarly, many years ago, when all were singing the praises of the superiority of the belt-drive over the idler-wheels they replaced, they chose to ignore the loss of dynamics and PRaT, of bass and excitement, and focused exclusively on other things, mainly a diminution of rumble (which it turns out was in many cases a myth and restricted to a few poorly set-up 'tables). Much more recently, the hyping of digital technologies also ignored the loss of musicality, and was leavened by a heady mix of misinformations, including the mythical increased dynamic range of digital media over analogue, which simple hearing (and various research papers which contradict the other research papers, which are based in unproven theories and the careful choosing of certain statistics and mathematics or other less "helpful" ones to achieve certain results on paper...Lies, Damned Lies, and Statistics) proves is not so. Which is to say that many "improvements" are bought at a price, that the price is utterly ignored, the pretense (La-La Land) being there isn't one, and that thus Progress and improvement is in many cases a myth. When the Denon's superiority (and many other pieces) in certain areas is accepted by the high-end designers and matched by them as a base-ground, THEN we will have Progress, not by pretending these superiorities, and the cost of losing them, doesn't exist. Those who take the time to actually listen to a properly set-up idler-wheel drive, rather than stick to their hoary old (and new) theories, learn this lesson.

Distilling all this, the Idler/Rega/Denon combo is THE greatest value in high-end audio today! Dependable and unfinicky too. Have fun all!!

I second it!!!