Building high-end 'tables cheap at Home Despot II

...or listen to records...

Arthur Salvatore has posted his preliminary impressions from critical listening to a tweaked, rebearinged and replinthed (looks like a Jean Nantais) Lenco idler-drive turntable, with a Graham Phantom II arm.

Salvatore has already reported that the Lenco/Graham was a better turntable than the Forsell, his longtime reference and itself no slouch.

Excerpts:

"I feel it is "highly probable" that the Lenco/Graham is the finest turntable/tonearm combination I've ever heard in my system (or anywhere else for the matter)...

"...At any one time, I have heard the Lenco/Graham Phantom II outperform, or at least equal, every other turntable/tonearm combination in my experience, at any price, and in every single sonic parameter. In fact, there is not one area where I can criticize it, when I have heard it at its best (with maybe the possible exception of lateral width, but only "maybe"). I find this state of affairs both amazing and inspiring.

"However, it is also important to state this contrasting fact: I have still yet to hear this combination do everything, at its best, all at the same time. This is why I am so frustrated, and also hesitant to make a definitive declaration. Still, I am confident that I can, eventually, and with some help, achieve this complete optimization. When I do, the critical details will be revealed and the highly deserved celebrations can begin, because it will indeed be an audio achievement to celebrate."

Of course, this virtually guarantees that those reviewers who are Salvatore enemies will try out a box-stock 1960 Bogen B-61 with an old slipping idler wheel and say it sounds like a 1950s kiddie phono compared to their latest monstrosity with a price into six figures.

Or they will assume the ostrich position ("I don't see how...") without LISTENING.

In any event, prices of Lencos are about to rise.

References: Salvatore's site

http://www.high-endaudio.com/RECENT.html

Lenco Heaven:

http://www.lencoheaven.net/forum/index.php?topic=2348.75

Dear Gp49, Have you seen a photo of the actual tt that Salvatore is listening to? If so, does it retain the original Lenco chassis, or has the chassis been ditched in favor of the Peter Reinder's PTP? I ask because I think the PTP makes a big improvement, bigger than any replacement bearing or after-market idler wheel, provided the original bearing and idler wheel are in primo condition. IOW, Salvatore may not yet have heard the best possible iteration of the Lenco. With the PTP, you don't get day to day changes in speed if everything is fastened down as it should be. And of course the motor is much better isolated from the bearing and platter.

Photos of what he says is a close duplicate to what he is listening to, were posted at Lenco Heaven.

It's based on a standard Lenco chassis on a large wooden plinth. It has a special upgrade bearing, added platter mass and a metacrylic mat. Tonearm is a Graham Phantom II. The only differences his will have are the record clamp and the phono interconnect cables.

A second test MIGHT be done using the PTP and a slate plinth, but quite some time after the first Lenco shootout.

Finally! The lenco is getting the review we all know it deserves... Let's all consider ourselves lucky to have gotten one ( or two)! While they were still unknown/unaccepted by 'the connisuers'!
My humble Lenco remains unchanged in essence two years on... I think that is a testament to the satisfying wholosity and groovidacious goodness one can attain with these humble machines... For a nuerotic tweaker to say 'good enough' ..... Speaks volumes!
Ancillaries will come and go, but tge centerpiece of 'tha system' the mighty Lenco, shall stay!
Jean, my belated apologies for not getting that slate to you but a new child, career, and obsession with flea amps, single drivers and horns sidetracked me considerably!
It seems that non-welsh slate has been widely accepted as an upgrade, or at the very least, alternative, to the classic cld plinth, and all I can say is: 'amen, and rock on, brothers'!!!
Harv