Yamaha GT-2000 from Japan or local TD-125?

It is not always the sideways movement that is discovered, as stated on previous occasions. When taking the Bearing Assembly apart, the Ball at the Thrust Interface, usually discovered to be a loose fit, or interference fit in the base of the Platter Spindle are on occasion found to be damaged with a Spalling and even worse a Scribing on the Ball Surface.

Either one of these being present is an indicator for Metal Particulate being free to migrate and is now included in the surfaces where there are interfaces between Sacrificial and Non-Sacrificial Materials.

Such an environment has the capability to cause unwanted damage to the non-sacrificial material.

It is an even worse condition when the housing is arid dry in relation to lubricant, loose and migrating metal particulate damage in this type of environment will need substantial skills to correct the damages being witnessed.

Again, it is each to their own, if the want of an individual is to use a $2K to $5K Cart' on TT, knowing it has such a condition, or potentially has such a condition, then that for me is just fine.     

Suffice to say that sideways movement, manifesting as platter wobble or run-out would be unusual in a high quality vintage DD turntable. No one doubts that the bearing of such a TT should be evaluated for excessive wear and serviced after purchase. I have had six higher end DD TTs, four of which are up and running in my systems (two Technics SP10 Mk2, one Mk3, one Denon DP80, one Victor TT101, and one Kenwood L07D). I’ve not seen a problem with bearings that required machining or replacing the entire structure. In nearly all cases, I have had to clean the bearing well and replace the lubricant, but no bearing assembly was bone dry upon receipt. Guess I am lucky. For me, the most common problem with a vintage DD TT is electronic in nature. Both my DP80 and my TT101 were acting funky when I bought them, but the late great Bill Thalmann fixed the DP80, once I found the necessary integrated circuit on line, and JP Jones fixed my TT101. I think my DP80 was run on 120V by its previous owner, when it wants 100V. That was not good for it.

I am in no way accusing the Vintage TT of any drive type as being a bad buy.

I am suggesting that when one is considering purchasing one there operational issues that will be discovered, but not in all cases.

One of my SP10 MK II's needed quite a thorough investigation to discover the electronics fault, but I don't usually refer to this, as the condition it was bought in for a pittance, meant what was discovered wrong with it was a result, as the parts and repair once known was proven to be straight forward for the SP10 Guru who is a friend. 

The OP is looking to spend over a $1K, I think the risk is for much less monies a TT can Pbe bought that has very similar operational issues. For a little more monies a Batch of Spare Parts are available if Won.

I have gone to the extremes of duplicate and triplicate TT's to ensure the Spares are readily available if other means are not suitable to repair.  

The OP is looking for their Dream Table, well at present that is fantastical as all info is off pictures, ones opinions or a Article featuring Info about the TT.

'The proof of the Pudding is in the Eating' - Caveat Emptor

I am happy to inform the OP, there is very good things to come, 'but', a little more might be required to get to that place. 

Hello Everyone, 

Just wanted to chime in as I haven;t responded in a bit.  Not too much more to add other than I've read all the posts carefully (thanks for the detailed responses lewm and pindac) and I'm taking everything into account.

As it stands, I'm pretty sold on getting GT-2000 fro Unisound.  I'm in talks with them now on eBay.   I'm not 100% sure how shipping would work if I won a bid on the From Japan/Yahoo website.   It almost seems like From Japan takes over the shipping for all sellers or something, and its also hard to find out how much it costs to ship internationally.  

Any vendor is obligated to reveal details of shipping to various parts of the world and cost. eBay requires that information to be displayed. So there should be no issue except to look at the seller feedback to see whether they have a history of careful packing, or not.