Linn LP12 turntable

Tomic , I was merely responding to posts by LP12 owners who mentioned it is susceptible to foot falls. To my way of thinking, that should be the last problem one might expect with a suspended TT. Which is why I asked. I am not the one claiming that footfalls are a problem; I’ve never owned an LP12, though my first real TT was an ARXA, back in the 70s.

Peace… F = MA and when a spring on any TT runs out of travel… things get ugly… the big Japanese TT are also susceptible on 2nd floors and suspended floors… even the mighty sota eventually runs out of travel….

Turntable suspensions are not designed to intercept foot falls, they are designed to isolate from the motor and higher frequency vibration. I used to have a AR which I literally could bang on the cover while playing and the tt would play on without skipping. But walk by it on the suspended floor would cause it to skip. Don't walk heavily by it while playing if it cannot be wall mounted. This does not need to be an issue. 

Let’s see. With what “higher frequency” did you bang on your AR? Most likely the frequency was 1Hz. A footfall is also 1Hz. So why shouldn’t the same suspension that filters out one one also filter out the other? What’s with F=ma? It’s true and always valid, but what did you have in mind? If you want to describe the force developed in a spring, don’t we want Hooke’s law, F= -kx? I’m assuming a well tuned spring suspension already. But of course a spring suspension needs to be damped; maybe that’s how a problem with footfalls might arise… if the disturbance sets the suspension into oscillation that is not damped.

The problem with LP12 upgrades is that the cost of an upgraded LP12 puts it into competition with a lot of newer turntables which, depending on the listener, may or may not be better. In its original form, the LP 12 was nothing special at all - woolly bass and sloppy sounding and lots of people who were not deafened by the hype preferred a Rega 3. It has gotten better over the years, admittedly. BTW, even back in the 80s when people were upgrading from the Grace 707 to the Ittok, the bearings in every 707 I ever saw were shot. Admittedly, they might survive with a high compliance MM, but most 707s were sold with the Supex 900 MC.