Is Direct Drive Really Better?

Can't speak for Sean, but it seems to me that is the argument. For example, the Nottingham has such a low torque motor (but high inertia platter) that you have to give it push to get the platter going. That's by design.

Bob ... actually you and I are in agreement. The torque is either in the high mass platter, or in the motor, or it is in both. Where it is doesn't matter, what matters is that there is plenty of it.

I'd even go further and say that, I would expect the theory to favor a belt driven table of very high mass, and with a very low torque motor, since a revolving high mass not only has plenty of torque, but because of the low torque motor it should also have a very high degree of speed stability, and noise rejection. The difficulty in the high torque motor approach is guaranteeing that the high torque motor is low noise, and has an extremely stable rotational speed.

But I'd still like to hear a Lenco, Garrard and SP10, and I'd be happy to buy whatever sounded best to me, regardless of my theoretical preconceptions.

My experience has been that solo piano is the torture test for turntable speed stability, so a dose of Beethoven piano sonatas should be all that's required to find the best turntable.

Lloyd Walker tells an amusing story that some of you may have heard... he was demonstrating his Proscenium turntable at a show a few years back when some attendees came in to talk with him about why he didn't use a high torque direct drive design for his table.

Their argument was that only such a design could maintain the pitch stability and drive that music required and that any belt driven turntable (such as the Walker Audio design he was demonstrating) was fundamentally flawed in design.

Lloyd was playing a piano recording at the time (certainly a good test of pitch stability). So, rather than spend a lot of time arguing, he pulled out a pair of scissors and CUT THE DRIVE BELT.

The record continued to play with no discernable change in pitch for at least 20 seconds.

And thus ended the debate.

NB: I own a Walker, so I've got a bias. But I've done the belt cutting routine here just to test Lloyd's story. Amazing what a virtually frictionless high mass (80+ lbs) platter design can accomplish with an extremely low torque motor. (Agree with you on this Seandtaylor99.)
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Hmmm....lots of misunderstandings here. First, to 4yanx and high-end designers. I don't mean high-end turntable designers, but designers of other equipment for which they want the best source they can find in order to demonstrate their wares to best effect. Of course a high-end turntable manufacturer won't be interested unless they use titanium nitrate and high-pressure ceramics developed for NASA to justify high price-tags, as you say. But when the high-end designers, of amps, preamps, speakers and distributors of the same start to use Lencos, Garrards, or other large idler-drives, because they don't sell turntables and don't give a rat's ass what they use as a source, so long as it makes their products sound as good as they can get them to sound, then people will sit up and take notice. This, unfortunately, is the situation, and so I'm opening a new "front". My concern is strictly with the truth, or more accurately, empirical reality. By your own honorable admission - and caveats about getting it set up right notwithstanding (this applies to all components, n'est-ce pas?) - the rebuilt Lencos beat belt-drives at several times their price, and I wonder if you have, in fact, ever heard a belt-drive, at any price, which could even match or beat a properly restored and implemented Lenco in a fair comparison?

Then there is your message here - "The best of our efforts will compete with turntables costing many times more, and we have friends that can attest to this fact. In some ways, they sound better, especially in the lower end and in that indefinable “pleasure” factor. I am neither an engineer nor a psychologist so I will not try to explain the “boogie factor” these tables seem to have." The fact that you can hear this, and it is repeatable from Lenco to Lenco despite differences in plinth materials, design and weight, points to something in the Lenco proper which accounts for this: it is superior speed stability, which in its turn underlines lack of same in belt-drives. It is, being audible, an empirical fact, and being audible there is a physical reason for it, no need for psychology beyond the human ear's EXTREME sensitivity to pitch (speed stability). It has speed stability which is superior to that of the belt-drives you have heard or compared it to. The rest, high frequencies and such-like, can be tuned by implementation, materials, tonearm/cartridge. And, since this "indefinable pleasure factor" is in fact beautiful music-making, then I submit that, this being THE most critical factor in building a successful stereo system and the whole reason we are in this game (not to reproduce boring and unpleasurable music), the Lenco and the idler-wheel drives it represents are quite simply superior to belt-drives, period. It's not about trumpeting the success of this design and "you have the wrong one", it's about deciding which is the best system. How many audiophiles buy one turntable and stay there? Yes, they are currently happy with their given belt-drive, but they will, down the road, spend likely several thousand dollars on another belt-drive, which is inferior to an idler-wheel drive, especially at music-making. If a large company with the resources decides to get into the game and start to produce reasonably-priced idler-wheel drives, we will ALL benefit. In the meantime, we can either get into a restoration DIY project, or get it done, still for far less than the high-end belt-drives which are their "competition".

And while it is true that Garrards 301s/401s and Thorens TD-124s have always had a following, my own thread was never about Lencos, it was using the Lencos which could be had cheaply, as bait to get the world to participate in testing out my claim that idler-wheel drive was a significantly better system than belt-drive and had been unfairly assassinated by a concerted effort of the press and industry (reminds me of digital). I being I think the first, and if not then definitely the most vocal and activist, to step forward and make the unequivocal claim this is so (and for which I get roundly criticized in the current politically-correct "no system is better than another" Western climate, but the battle is what makes it worthwhile ;-)) and challenging the world to a showdown to prove or disprove it (check out my first colossal flop attempt, flop), after which I devised the crafty Home Despot tactic. This is my contribution to the evolution of audio, not simply the discovery of the Lenco (important but not that important by itself without the attendant examination of the logical implications). I discovered the Lenco, actually, because I could not find the Garrards 301/401 I was in fact looking for after tripping over a Garrard SP-25 at a flea-market in Helsinki (I had never even heard of an idler-wheel drive at that point, before the internet), tweaking it, and finding it significantly better than either my Maplenoll (still considered one of the Great Belt-Drives) or Audiomeca turntables in all the most important ways (amazing even at detail)!

Hi Sean: let me use another word, as by "torque" I was thinking, indeed, in automotive terms, in terms of "applied" force, in the sense of an active force, such as a motor. The torque, as in stored energy/moment of inertia, is not sufficient to combat stylus force drag, it takes an active motor force to push the platter through the dramatically-cut grooves and the variable stylus force drag they cause: it will still slow, the belt stretch, and then contract, albeit more slowly as it has to drag so much mass, and the motors used in belt-drives are insufficient to push the LP through and keep the speed rock-steady. In the case of an idler-wheel drive, the motor is powerful, spins at high rpms which by itself tends to smooth out speed imperfections, and it is securely coupled to the platter/flywheel by the rubber wheel, which does not slip, stretch or contract, and which in its turn regulates the motor, making its rotation more perfect. These three elements - powerful high-rpm motor, grippy wheel, flywheel-platter (especially in the Lenco) - create a closed system which utterly ignores stylus force drag, or the cartridge and arm action. The belt-drive/high-mass/high moment of inertia is not a closed system, the stylus force drag will affect the speed to a certain extent, and the proof of this is in the listening. I had a Maplenolll Ariadne with 40-pound lead/graphite platter (the prototype for the Walker Proscenium), and despite the 40-pound platter, it could not equal the Lenco for PRaT, dynamics or even detail and focus/clarity, and this was in the old days before the Lenco plinth and design underwent all sorts of evolutionary steps forward, resulting in a LARGE improvement in overall sound quality over the old early days. Since, I have not yet heard the belt-drive which can even come close to a giant Direct-Coupled Lenco (which maximizes the plinth's noise damping properties and provides for even more stable speed), and can one say that a VPI TNT does not even come close to a Clearaudio Master Reference? Even if this is so, then the Lenco does too and it will be an interesting comparison when finally I get the chance to do it, or someone else. Again, the proof is in the listening, keep your ears open for idler-drives at your local audio shows! I know they are currently fashionable at European audio shows.

Hi Jack, the Thorens is actually a quasi-idler-wheel drive, as the idler-wheel drives a flywheel, which is linked to the platter/main bearing by a belt, so it's back to square one. Given this fact, I expect the restored Lenco to sound quite a bit better. But, the Thorens has a heavier platter, and a high-speed high-torque motor, which belt-drives do not, so the results should be extremely pleasing nevertheless. I am actually currently working on a perfect TD-124 MKI which I will sell on after my experiments, and it has the iron platter. It does indeed attract MCs (MMs no effect) with their more powerful magnets, but the way around this is by use of a glass platter to raise the record at a great enough distance to eliminate this effect, which I have. Anyway, I will build it into a similar plinth to the one developed for the Lenco, high-mass and inert, and report on the experiment on the Home Despot thread (you can get immediately to the last page by clicking on the double arrows at the end of the page numbers). And btw, the Lenco properly implemented (not so difficult, but time-consuming) is in fact quieter than any high-end belt-drive against which it has been pitted so far, the latest local convert commenting that his Lenco is quieter than his Rega P9 with RB-1000 tonearm (which sonically is not even close to being in the same league, in any respect whatsoever), which currently gathers dust. In fact, two things leap out in any demonstration I have participated in so far, ahead of the bass and astonishing lively dynamics: they are all astonished at the extreme quietness/blackness, and they can actually hear the incredible speed stability, not as a result of clarity or detail or what-not, but as actual clearly audible and striking speed stability! Now THAT's speed stability.

I think I made this point once before. If the reason the Lencos sound better is superior speed stability, then CD should have kicked vinyl's butt long ago. I would look elsewhere for the reason you prefer the sound of idler wheels.