Vintage DD turntables. Are we living dangerously?


I have just acquired a 32 year old JVC/Victor TT-101 DD turntable after having its lesser brother, the TT-81 for the last year.
TT-101
This is one of the great DD designs made at a time when the giant Japanese electronics companies like Technics, Denon, JVC/Victor and Pioneer could pour millions of dollars into 'flagship' models to 'enhance' their lower range models which often sold in the millions.
Because of their complexity however.......if they malfunction.....parts are 'unobtanium'....and they often cannot be repaired.
128x128halcro
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Downunder, My Mk3 is mounted in a 70-lb slate slab, 2.5 inches thick.  The slab is mated to a solid cherry base that is about the same size as the slate.  I epoxy'd some threaded inserts into the slate and bolted the wood base into those, for good Constrained Layer Damping.  Then I made some slate armboards for this plinth.  The 10.5-inch Reed 2A tonearm (Red Cedar wand) is mounted on a slate arm board which is also bolted into the slate slab.  The whole thing probably weighs about 100 lbs. In order to maneuver it so I could get some home -made footers under it (and some Stillpoints), I placed a deflated inner tube under the plinth and then inflated it, so as to raise up the structure.  Lifting it and then simultaneously putting something under it was a non-starter. It sits atop an Adona rack.  I use a Boston Audio Mat2.  There may or may not be a photo on my system site.

Sorry about mis-counting the poles on a Mk3 motor.  I was going on memory, as I was not about to take the platter off just to count the poles.
Forgot to mention that I built a bearing damper exactly like Albert Porter's idea, into the cherry base of the above plinth.  Albert uses a block of iron.  I am leery of putting that much iron near the motor's rotor, which in the Mk3 is a gigantic circular magnet bolted onto the underside of the platter.  So I used a brass block of similar dimensions and mass.  A threaded brass rod perforates the brass block and makes contact at its upper end with the bearing housing.  Albert uses this idea in his Panzerholz plinths, assuming he still makes them.  I just snug the brass rod up against the bearing assembly; not too tight, just snug.  
@lewn, just took a peek at your SP10 Mk3 on your system profile, very nicely done.  I like it a lot.