Here is the promised information, which includes the rationale for this project and suggestions for experimenters and for doubters and DIYs and other possibilities. Refer to the other Home Depot thread for more in-depth information. I will start with the question that started it (sorry Will), then the answer:
Johnnantais
I am a bit bemused by the statement you make that we should not bother with European GL75 motor units? As I am in UK these are the only ones available to me, I was not aware that there were any differences between these and US ones other than motor voltage and frequency?
regards
willbewill
Willbewill, it is the frequency which matters, of course, since the AC motors rotate according to this. So, while the Lenco motors can be very easily re-wired for North American voltage without modification (in fact Lenco motors have schematics for this either glued on, or actually cast into the motor cradle!), nothing can be done about the frequency. In my experience all Lenco wheels - North American and European - are precisely the same dimensions, though as I have evidently not bought every model made for every year, I am not absolutely certain this was always the case. Lenco actually machined the motor shafts against which the wheels turn to give the proper speed differently for each continent, as the top-plate "identations" for the speed clearly visible on the photos give the same speed on both continents. To tell you the truth, I never thought this made sense, as it seems to me that it would be far simpler and cheaper to simply manufacture larger and smaller wheels, though actually this may have been impossible due to the rigid design, top-plate, etc., which is designed for a certain clearance for the arm/wheel and so on. This means that the European 50 Hz spindle is larger than the North American 60 Hz spindle. Now the Lencos being infinitely adjustable, one would think we could simply compensate by sliding the idler wheel up or down - and the Lenco is actually built so you can do this by moving the speed "brackets" back or forth before "setting" them - but while this works for all speeds, there is a sudden drop-off in the spindle (a "shelf") at precisely the 33 1/3 RPM point which makes it impossible (for my Lenco at least) to get a precise 33 1/3. If others have different motor spindles than my own European model (this is entirely possible) which do accomodate the change-over, please report back to this post. In the meantime, until you know exactly what to look for and how to test it, European models are best avoided in North America. I would like to point out though that considering the Lenco's price, building a plinth for the Lenco in Europe is not a wasted effort, as a Lenco can simply be bought in North America and popped right in. This also gives you spare parts, just in case: platter, wheel, bits and pieces.
As to the belt-drive Garrard, you know I never noticed it was belt-drive, as I never really read this thing? I wondered what they were on about as it seemed to me in Europe that this thing had incredible sound quality (without the refinement, however, of the Lenco). Which brings me to one of the main points concerning the amazing sound quality of these idler wheels. The idler wheel has no "rubber-band syndrome" happening which essentially means constant speed variation inherent in belt-drive designs. This is why the substitution of thread for the rubber band brings universal improvement. The idler wheel addresses this. Since there seems to be a problem with old information, and this thread is getting rather long, I will quote from a reply above: "I also strongly suspect, after listening to the very clean transient starts and stops supported by this turntable, that its high torque drive system suffers less from dynamic slowing than belt drives. That's why it not only sounds dynamic, but has a very good sense of pace and rhythmic control." This is taken from the Hi-fi World test I quoted earlier.
The other reason idler wheels sound so good is their motors: I have repeatedly described the incredible engineering of these beasts: 4-pole AC COGLESS motors, hand-balanced (even the ugly little record-changer Garrard SP-25s), spinning on hardened steel bearings. Much of the vibration/rumble everyone is worried about is due to their experience of the COGGING UNBALANCED motors used in belt-drive designs, which MUST be isolated as they actually, despite their (vastly) slower rotating speed and great relative weakness and mass, vibrate like hell. Do not fall into the trap of applying experience of noise made by little off-balance cogging motors to idler-wheel motors. Idler wheel motors are entirely different beasts, and also have high-mass relative to belt-drive cogging beasties, and being cogless, act as their own fly-wheels, and they spin from four to more than ten times faster than belt-drive motors, thus further smoothing out speed irregularities.
Remember, they are individually balanced in labs: to see the principle at work, perform this cheap and interesting experiment: Buy a Garrard SP25 (any model, but the later ones - MKIII and IVs - are actually quite good and have tweak potential!) for $2 at a flea market or garage sale, they are incredibly common - 10,000 a week shipped to the U.S. alone during their heyday - and people are only too happy to get rid of them. You paid two bucks, don't hesitate, take it apart and remove the motor (I think you may actually be able to take it apart without removing the motor, as there are bolts holding the assembly together underneath, though this is a distant memory). Disassembling the motor will reveal the stainless steel bearing shaft, and little drill holes around the circumference: these are the evidence of the individual balancing. Put the spindle back in, give it a spin with your fingers. Heft it: heavy, smooth, substantial. Compare to belt-drive motor: no comparison.
Which brings me back to why the belt-drive Garrard Zero 100 is considered so good by TNT: while it is belt-drive, it still has that superb Garrard motor (but in my estimation the Lenco motor is even more superb), which is like applying a totally Lintoed Linn motor to a humble 'table, only the Garrard motor is even better than this. No expensive after-market band-aids are needed to compensate for what is a crappy little cogging motor, which is cheap to boot! I remember that one of the last improvements of the famed Versa Dynamics 'table was the inclusion of just such a cogless, 4-pole motor, which the designer explained needed no expensive electronic filtering. He said that they cost $300 each from the manufacturer, which explains why the crappy kind is now universally used. Origin Live's $500-$600 motor is just such a cogless motor, though far less substantial than those commonly found in idler-wheel decks such as the SP25s, and in early '70s belt-drives.
For those who are convinced due to the Dogma perpetrated by the "establishment" (remember, this is the same thinking/establishment which declared transistors vastly superior to tubes) that belt-drive is the only way to go, I offer the following possibility: early '70s belt-drives often included these superb motors, as they were much more common at the time. You can recognize designs using this type of motor by the very thin pulleys, and by the fact you can actually spin them by hand like a top. Recently I found and bought a humble '70s CEC belt-drive which is actually very similar to the Rega 'tables, the BD-2200: solid plinth, no automatic mechanism, quite a decent arm (similar to the original Rega Arms, RB200 I think) with removable headshell, only an on/off swith, speed selector (mechanical), and raise/lower mechanism. I bought it for $10, including Ortofon MC10 MKII, and it's mint and quite attractive in Nextel grey. I owned a Rega Planar 3, and I would say the CEC easily bests it: extremely dynamic, lively, powerful bass, like the belt-drive Garrard. Why? Because of that motor, and also because it is quite well designed and built. I am constantly thinking about downgrading, and consider which equipment I would choose, this 'table being among these. When I want to astonish my friends, I say "Want to hear what $10 sounds like?" and I hook it up. They are astonished and say "It must be because of your speakers" and so on...
Another cheap experiment for those who want to only dip their toes in the water without too much bother or money: Garrard SP25s fill every nook and cranny of this continent and the rest of the world. They can usually be had for $2-$5. Early models had partly iron platters (inner platter) which attract the cartridges above, thus increasing downforce (it took me a while to figure out what was going on because as the cartridge neared the center where the iron was the down force "magically" increased dramatically: a comedy!) so do not buy these. I removed everything which was not directly connected to the drive system, removing all rattling parts related to the automatic features, which is all gears and levers made of metal, because they rattled. I soldered a better cable to the tonearm tags. I cleaned and re-oiled the main bearing and the bearing to the motor. Install decent MM cartridge. I sunstituted the cheap AC cord with 18-gauge solid-core the motor (this works, I do this for ALL my 'tables!). Tell me you don't hear an astonishing amount of detail, power, dynamics and Prat even from this little spud. A millionaire I knew in Europe, who owned a high-end system using the Grasshopper cartridge, visited me one day and I played some music on this Garrard. He was astonished, said he felt the hairs go up on his arms, and signed a check to me for several thousand dollars to develop the idea further. He accepted what he heard, and did not let dogma influence his thinking any further. The result of that money and research was the Lenco project which is the subject of this thread. So the SP25 project is cheap-cheap, an afternoon's work, and easy. Also very educational, as you will understand then that the true heart of a 'table is not the platter/bearing, but the motor. It is the motor which determines speed, and it is accurate speed which all the high-end 'tables are trying to achieve with their outboard power supplies, their flywheels, their flywheel-platters, ect. Of course noise is a great issue which is addressed by non-resonant plinths, accurate main bearings, isolation and so forth, but without accurate speed, what is this worth?
So: more cheap fun (not even the cost of a pint!), more experiments, more education a la crystal radio set. More cheap alternatives for those who want high performance for literally the price of a beer or two. Belt-drive CECs or idler-wheel Garrards, take your pick! It's Christmas!
Johnnantais
I am a bit bemused by the statement you make that we should not bother with European GL75 motor units? As I am in UK these are the only ones available to me, I was not aware that there were any differences between these and US ones other than motor voltage and frequency?
regards
willbewill
Willbewill, it is the frequency which matters, of course, since the AC motors rotate according to this. So, while the Lenco motors can be very easily re-wired for North American voltage without modification (in fact Lenco motors have schematics for this either glued on, or actually cast into the motor cradle!), nothing can be done about the frequency. In my experience all Lenco wheels - North American and European - are precisely the same dimensions, though as I have evidently not bought every model made for every year, I am not absolutely certain this was always the case. Lenco actually machined the motor shafts against which the wheels turn to give the proper speed differently for each continent, as the top-plate "identations" for the speed clearly visible on the photos give the same speed on both continents. To tell you the truth, I never thought this made sense, as it seems to me that it would be far simpler and cheaper to simply manufacture larger and smaller wheels, though actually this may have been impossible due to the rigid design, top-plate, etc., which is designed for a certain clearance for the arm/wheel and so on. This means that the European 50 Hz spindle is larger than the North American 60 Hz spindle. Now the Lencos being infinitely adjustable, one would think we could simply compensate by sliding the idler wheel up or down - and the Lenco is actually built so you can do this by moving the speed "brackets" back or forth before "setting" them - but while this works for all speeds, there is a sudden drop-off in the spindle (a "shelf") at precisely the 33 1/3 RPM point which makes it impossible (for my Lenco at least) to get a precise 33 1/3. If others have different motor spindles than my own European model (this is entirely possible) which do accomodate the change-over, please report back to this post. In the meantime, until you know exactly what to look for and how to test it, European models are best avoided in North America. I would like to point out though that considering the Lenco's price, building a plinth for the Lenco in Europe is not a wasted effort, as a Lenco can simply be bought in North America and popped right in. This also gives you spare parts, just in case: platter, wheel, bits and pieces.
As to the belt-drive Garrard, you know I never noticed it was belt-drive, as I never really read this thing? I wondered what they were on about as it seemed to me in Europe that this thing had incredible sound quality (without the refinement, however, of the Lenco). Which brings me to one of the main points concerning the amazing sound quality of these idler wheels. The idler wheel has no "rubber-band syndrome" happening which essentially means constant speed variation inherent in belt-drive designs. This is why the substitution of thread for the rubber band brings universal improvement. The idler wheel addresses this. Since there seems to be a problem with old information, and this thread is getting rather long, I will quote from a reply above: "I also strongly suspect, after listening to the very clean transient starts and stops supported by this turntable, that its high torque drive system suffers less from dynamic slowing than belt drives. That's why it not only sounds dynamic, but has a very good sense of pace and rhythmic control." This is taken from the Hi-fi World test I quoted earlier.
The other reason idler wheels sound so good is their motors: I have repeatedly described the incredible engineering of these beasts: 4-pole AC COGLESS motors, hand-balanced (even the ugly little record-changer Garrard SP-25s), spinning on hardened steel bearings. Much of the vibration/rumble everyone is worried about is due to their experience of the COGGING UNBALANCED motors used in belt-drive designs, which MUST be isolated as they actually, despite their (vastly) slower rotating speed and great relative weakness and mass, vibrate like hell. Do not fall into the trap of applying experience of noise made by little off-balance cogging motors to idler-wheel motors. Idler wheel motors are entirely different beasts, and also have high-mass relative to belt-drive cogging beasties, and being cogless, act as their own fly-wheels, and they spin from four to more than ten times faster than belt-drive motors, thus further smoothing out speed irregularities.
Remember, they are individually balanced in labs: to see the principle at work, perform this cheap and interesting experiment: Buy a Garrard SP25 (any model, but the later ones - MKIII and IVs - are actually quite good and have tweak potential!) for $2 at a flea market or garage sale, they are incredibly common - 10,000 a week shipped to the U.S. alone during their heyday - and people are only too happy to get rid of them. You paid two bucks, don't hesitate, take it apart and remove the motor (I think you may actually be able to take it apart without removing the motor, as there are bolts holding the assembly together underneath, though this is a distant memory). Disassembling the motor will reveal the stainless steel bearing shaft, and little drill holes around the circumference: these are the evidence of the individual balancing. Put the spindle back in, give it a spin with your fingers. Heft it: heavy, smooth, substantial. Compare to belt-drive motor: no comparison.
Which brings me back to why the belt-drive Garrard Zero 100 is considered so good by TNT: while it is belt-drive, it still has that superb Garrard motor (but in my estimation the Lenco motor is even more superb), which is like applying a totally Lintoed Linn motor to a humble 'table, only the Garrard motor is even better than this. No expensive after-market band-aids are needed to compensate for what is a crappy little cogging motor, which is cheap to boot! I remember that one of the last improvements of the famed Versa Dynamics 'table was the inclusion of just such a cogless, 4-pole motor, which the designer explained needed no expensive electronic filtering. He said that they cost $300 each from the manufacturer, which explains why the crappy kind is now universally used. Origin Live's $500-$600 motor is just such a cogless motor, though far less substantial than those commonly found in idler-wheel decks such as the SP25s, and in early '70s belt-drives.
For those who are convinced due to the Dogma perpetrated by the "establishment" (remember, this is the same thinking/establishment which declared transistors vastly superior to tubes) that belt-drive is the only way to go, I offer the following possibility: early '70s belt-drives often included these superb motors, as they were much more common at the time. You can recognize designs using this type of motor by the very thin pulleys, and by the fact you can actually spin them by hand like a top. Recently I found and bought a humble '70s CEC belt-drive which is actually very similar to the Rega 'tables, the BD-2200: solid plinth, no automatic mechanism, quite a decent arm (similar to the original Rega Arms, RB200 I think) with removable headshell, only an on/off swith, speed selector (mechanical), and raise/lower mechanism. I bought it for $10, including Ortofon MC10 MKII, and it's mint and quite attractive in Nextel grey. I owned a Rega Planar 3, and I would say the CEC easily bests it: extremely dynamic, lively, powerful bass, like the belt-drive Garrard. Why? Because of that motor, and also because it is quite well designed and built. I am constantly thinking about downgrading, and consider which equipment I would choose, this 'table being among these. When I want to astonish my friends, I say "Want to hear what $10 sounds like?" and I hook it up. They are astonished and say "It must be because of your speakers" and so on...
Another cheap experiment for those who want to only dip their toes in the water without too much bother or money: Garrard SP25s fill every nook and cranny of this continent and the rest of the world. They can usually be had for $2-$5. Early models had partly iron platters (inner platter) which attract the cartridges above, thus increasing downforce (it took me a while to figure out what was going on because as the cartridge neared the center where the iron was the down force "magically" increased dramatically: a comedy!) so do not buy these. I removed everything which was not directly connected to the drive system, removing all rattling parts related to the automatic features, which is all gears and levers made of metal, because they rattled. I soldered a better cable to the tonearm tags. I cleaned and re-oiled the main bearing and the bearing to the motor. Install decent MM cartridge. I sunstituted the cheap AC cord with 18-gauge solid-core the motor (this works, I do this for ALL my 'tables!). Tell me you don't hear an astonishing amount of detail, power, dynamics and Prat even from this little spud. A millionaire I knew in Europe, who owned a high-end system using the Grasshopper cartridge, visited me one day and I played some music on this Garrard. He was astonished, said he felt the hairs go up on his arms, and signed a check to me for several thousand dollars to develop the idea further. He accepted what he heard, and did not let dogma influence his thinking any further. The result of that money and research was the Lenco project which is the subject of this thread. So the SP25 project is cheap-cheap, an afternoon's work, and easy. Also very educational, as you will understand then that the true heart of a 'table is not the platter/bearing, but the motor. It is the motor which determines speed, and it is accurate speed which all the high-end 'tables are trying to achieve with their outboard power supplies, their flywheels, their flywheel-platters, ect. Of course noise is a great issue which is addressed by non-resonant plinths, accurate main bearings, isolation and so forth, but without accurate speed, what is this worth?
So: more cheap fun (not even the cost of a pint!), more experiments, more education a la crystal radio set. More cheap alternatives for those who want high performance for literally the price of a beer or two. Belt-drive CECs or idler-wheel Garrards, take your pick! It's Christmas!
