Linn Bedrok LP12 Plinth Upgrade

Not to beat a tired horse, but when I first read the word "fettler" on this thread, I had no trouble understanding its meaning, owing to our use of the term "fiddling", meaning to mess around with a complex object, and the obvious relationship to the term "fine fettle".  Funnily, in American English, we generally don't use "fiddler" synonymously with fettler.  That term is reserved for actual musicians who play the fiddle. The Wiki definitions are obviously biased toward American English.

Mylogic, What I meant was that the DM101 just based on photos appears to have no damping for its spring suspension, which is generally needed to prevent overshoot and oscillation of the suspension.  Hence, I guess, the Logic Bounce that you mention.

Fans of the Who - and Tommy, in particular - may have a rather different interpretation of the term "fiddle".

Separately, the LP12 was also designed with undamped suspension - SME and modern Oracles have silicone damping for their suspensions.

@lewm

Damped suspension

The logic bounce l referred to is excess downforce applied to the spindle while playing a record. The sub-chassis will violently bounce up and down and the cartridge will not leave the groove. Also no change in the pitch of the recording playback. The deck will recover as if nothing has happened. That is also true of footfall…..no effect on the turntable, it is quite oblivious to it.

The Logic DM101 in its various forms never had damped springs. Any tweaks on that model were due to the scarcity of replacing stretched springs after hit and miss results of sourcing replacements from basic hardware stores. Often a damping tweak was tried to match the characteristic bounce if the new springs were too weak.

Of the higher quality turntables circa 70s and 80s l have owned, Garrard 401, Thorens TD124 mk2, CJ Walker 55, Systemdek III and the Logic DM101, none from the start have ever had damped springs.

l believe you mentioned a Garrard 401 in your system and were sourcing a new plinth?. My early series 401 (with the flush mount strobe light) was mounted in the huge ‘SME Plinth System’. The plinth base and depth was so big to accomodate the widest and deepest decks. The cover was of similar height to the plinth and designed to take the tallest 9 and 12’’ arms. It became unwieldily in my living room and absolutely dominated it. That was why l parted company with the set up in the 80s…..it was a bad move looking back now! The idea of having two turntables in a lounge back then would have been unthinkable, but now is not too much of a wierd idea.

Like @lewm, the AR XA was my first good table. But the arm wasn't so hot. I replaced the AR with a Thorens TD-150, which had a suspension, platter, and bearing very similar to the AR, but with a much better arm.

I then got a TD-125 (with an SME 3009 mounted on it), which was nothing but trouble. I had it in the repair shop many, many times, and the electronics were never fixed. Too complicated.

The Linn Sondek was a much better approach to turntable design. The basic design (including 3-pt. spring suspension) was the same as the AR and Thorens, but with superior machining and finishing (especially of the bearing).

While folks have a point that the LP12 was derived from designs like the AR etc., it has now evolved into a far superior product. 

I question how many here who have posted so far have actually heard a new Linn LP12, even if it is a Majik ( entry level) version?