A Copernican View of the Turntable System

Banquo, Good to know that you finally found peace with Bill Thalmann. I don't know how you (and others) are managing to use more than one outboard pod with the SP10. The square escutcheon that surrounds the platter really interdicts the use of more than one tonearm, which must be placed alongside the right-hand edge of the square, which allows a short enough distance to the spindle to permit alignment of a 9- or 10-inch arm. From all other sides, perhaps only a 12-inch arm can be aligned. But obviously you are making it work, somehow. The Denon tt's present no problem in this regard.
Nandric, Removing the bottom of the SP10 chassis would be a big mistake, IMO. It would reduce structural integrity of the whole, leave the on-board electronics open to the elements, and eliminate any way to provide a solid mount for the tt.

Hi Henry - all I do with the sp10 is put a record on it - use my choice of clamp depending on the record and hit start. I never lean on it. Raul suggested the 616's originally I think?

Those 616's are very hard to find were not a North American product. I got mine from a fluke - someone from Holland responded to a wanted ad I had placed.

My second sp10 will be using spikes. IMO as long as the platform you are using is level and isolated well, then any good manufacturer footers would work depending on your application.

Once you have reached this level - what became more important to me was how high the footers needed to be - if they were fixed or adjustable - this all helped to determine how high tall the pod would end up being and how much adjustability needed to be put into the threaded spikes.

Nikola - I agree with what Lew said about the sp10 and its guts kinda of just hanging there with cover removed. I also know when not to mess with a good thing when I hear it. The same "abstract thinking" would apply to Henry's JVC ?

Lew - My site has pictures of multiple arms being used as well as I believe Banquo's and Dgob's sites.

Cheers Chris

Dear Chris, This hobby is not only irrational but it also
make you greedy. I at last got a perfect SP 10 mk2 with all capacitors renewed but have no idea what to do with it.
Like those MM carts: buy now ,fast and as many as possible
and think or test later.Then this ebay 'syndrome' is realy
addictive. I am not able at the moment to resist but reduced my search to 'only' German ebay and ebay.com. The English have actualy nothing to offer(qua MM carts). BTW
I am very reluctant to remove my Kuzma and put the SP-10 instead.

Dear Lew, Thanks for the worning . I somehow thought that Raul recommended removal of the cover in casu.

Dear Halcro, I 'inspected' your system and have seen that
your DDTT is an Denon(?). Are we tolking about different animals? There is no place, so to speak, for the spikes on the underside of the SP-10. Or so I thought.

Regards,

To all of you plinth-less persons, it is possible and permissible to do something different from what Raul does and still get satisfactory results. Think outside Raul's box. The AT616 feet may be good, but they cannot possibly be the only "good" option for feet. Also, I wonder what you are all using for platter mats. I found the stock rubber mat supplied with my SP10 Mk2A was easily bested by an SAEC SS300 metal mat (purchased from Raul, by the way), and I am sure other mats would also be superior to the rubber. One that I aim to try on my Mk3 is a Boston Audio Mat2. The Mat2 has about the same weight as the stock rubber mat and so should have no deleterious effect on function of the servo mechanism. (I don't recommend a super heavy mat for that reason.) My experience tells me that the stock rubber mat may be responsible for the the closed-in, grayish, dull tonal quality that some have ascribed to direct-drive turntables. (I have seen each of these adjectives used; take your pick.) I even think that the stock mat may have more to do with the tone than does the plinth or lack of same.

Nandric: what Lewm said.

Lewm: As you can see from my system pics, my second arm is behind the tt and in from the left edge by about 4 inches. The pod was designed so that it could go partially underneath the tt's square top (that is crucial). The pivot to spindle distance is 230mm and that's no problem.

Halcro: I'm not sure what you are imagining with the rocking, but I should say that I'm beginning to become suspicious of the ridigity of my system. I received my Mint protractor a few weeks back and it makes me appreciate the very fine adjustments required to maintain proper alignment. The 616 footers are great for isolation and leveling, but the contact between their smooth tops and the bottom of the tt's chassis is probably less secure than the ideal. To test this, I'm going to recheck alignment in another week. If it's off, I'll blame the footers. It may be an easy fix, just a matter of adding some blu-tac between footer and tt, but we'll see. The contact between bottoms of footers and platform is definitely secure as those suckers are not easy to move once settled.

Chris: indeed the footers' ability to be adjusted is key, otherwise leveling would be haphazard. Is the contact between the top of your footers and tt secure? I'll pm you regarding price; it's complicated.