Building high-end 'tables cheap at Home Despot II

I am going to regale the audience here with a choice bit of wisdom, from one of the world's greatest writers, Khalil Gibran: "It is easier to write upon the water, than to teach a fool anything."

We'll let that stand alone up there, apart were it can be savoured. Which, translated further, but at a lower level (meant more for insects and such-like) would mean "Don't waste time with fools." So, henceforth, I give notice I won't even bother to read posts from this source, the Fool Pool, life is too short and I have better things to do, this is a waste of my - and everybody's - time. If, in one chance in 100 billion, the posts have any value at all (but I think I am safe in assuming "NO"), then I profusely apologize. If, on the other hand, such posts reveal the smallness and meanness of certain characters, then this is the only wise way to deal with it. Like stepping in excrement, then stuck on one's shoes, it may not be my fault, but I'll take the smell of it into the next room I walk into. 'Nuff said.

In my last and most recent voyage, I had brought a laptop with me, on which was downloaded years of research in science and history I accumulated through roughly 15 years of travel around the world. Various people I met around the world over this period had dreams of a man traveling with a typewriter, and then met me along the road. It was on this extremely lengthy travel-adventure that I discovered, in Helsinki (I met a beauty in the Greek islands, who agreed to meet me in Cairo, and I in turn agreed to follow her to Helsinki), the existence of the idler-wheel principle, and failing in my search for a Garrard 301 or 401 (before the days of the internet) found instead the Lenco. Upon my eventual return to Canada years later, I fell back into media analysis which, thanks to the internet was now done from home, with e-mail attachments. I had resisted the internet to this point (and still resist the cellphone), but had no choice. While on-line and bored, I discovered Audiogon (I feel for them) and started to make trouble - but ** constructive** trouble - via certain threads I initiated, debates I joined in on and, of course, the Home Despot thread/Lenco/Idler movement. Simply clicking on the links under my monicker confirms this, for those who think rather than excrete noxious airs. The time I will continue to devote to record players is limited, I am working once again on the book, which thanks to fortuitous meetings and findings, is once again on-track.

I'm currently playing with an Antique Sound Lab AQ2006DT full-function all-tube preamp, being a great fan of the ASL sound (full of PRaT, slam and excitement) and it is a sweeeeetttt honey of a preamp. Makes me want to buy matching ASL amps. I love the budget ethos, I love the sound (Joseph and I see ear to ear on what music reproduction should sound like). For now I have it matched to the Leak, but it is soooo sweet I will also match it to the ultra-fast Mitsubishi dual-mono SS amp and see what happens. Can't stop fooling around. In the meantime, I have to re-tube my CJ PV-8.

Anyway, remember the fun all, and watch what you step in.

About the hype of the slate plinth, could we say it realy is superior to a massive selected hardwood for a TD 124 or Garrard 301 or is it just...hype ?

A while back in my travels I discovered the conrad-johnson PV10BL line preamp. There have been many posts on the matter but I have concluded thoroughly that RCA Command Blackpaltes doing 12AU7 duty are unsurpassed. A nice old school hazy schmoozy sound. A little fuzzy and compressed in comparison to other world class preamps, I must say, but when I makes a discovery I sticks with it.

Upon my eventual return to Jersey I discovered the Hagerman Clarinet Line Preamp. As an expert on these things I must say that it surpasses the c-j handily in air, extension, and detail.

But to stay with the PV well then I will provide a small service to you. There may be a little oscialltion that may make your tubes seem noisy. Not sure if this fault stretches back to the 8 but the 10 had it. See the following link for the fix: http://home.comcast.net/~omaille/audio/PV10BL/PV10BL.html

Of course now you can say you discovered it. No need to thank me. My goodness Jean, hand me a napkin; I think I stepped in something.

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Hi Jloveys, tell you the truth, until I hear it for myself, I can't say. Which is why I am commissioning two stone plinths, one of slate and one of something else. Also to realize - finally - that first dream I had of a marble Lenco back in the Helsinki days. But, my alarm bells ring when I read statements like "the best minds seem to be going towards slate", when, in fact, slate was never compared to any other type of stone and reported on and, as well, that the current slate craze started in Wales, world exporter of slate (and not much else, all due respect to the Welsh).

Add to that various well-known crazes in audio, like digital amps (which lose their allure after one gets used to them) and the well-known audiophile equipment trick of emphasizing the higher frequencies in order to present bogus detail (which has worked repeatedly over the years), and the fact that stone will reflect energies far more than any type of wood so leading to this similar unbalance, and I have cause to be suspicious. Add, furthermore, the well-known propensity of many audiophiles to always look for the exotic and difficult over the simple and effective (consider cables, complex circuitry, multiple-layer podded belt-drive monstrosities, etc.). But, I also respect many of those espousing slate, which explains why I will go to the trouble of having a slate plinth made. Finally, slate is not the CLD material it is made out to be, what it is is endless layers of the same material, fractious exactly where these layers meet each other, which might lead to yet more detail emphasis rather than, like certain wood products, absorption of noise and neutral preservation of true tonalities and so forth. Marble and travertine, however, both made of conglomerates of disparate materials, far better deserve the characterization of "CLD" (and are beautiful to boot). Anyway, we'll find out, and I will report honestly, as always. Might be my farewell present to myself.

In other news, I recently finished a Garrard 301 project, which involved a Loricraft power supply. I built it into an Ultra birch-ply/mdf plinth (larger than the usual 23" x 19" x 6" plinth), mounted both a Triplanar VII and a 12" cherry tonearm to it (and tested that with my Denon 103"E") and found it to be exceedingly good. This was definitely the best result I have ever gotten from a Garrard, and the fellow it belonged to reported it was the best playback he has ever heard (saying it handily outperforms both the exotic-material Raven and the SME 30) and that it beat his EMM Labs digital set-up (retrieving previously-unheard detail), though it's hard to say whether it was the mass, the power supply, or both. Coincidentally, in a recent talk with someone (I forget who now) I was told it was an underground understanding that Garrards sound best at 240V, and the Loricraft power supply allows just this. So, for those who own Garrards, it might be something to try to get a step-up transformer - assuming you have the "original" European wheels - and try this out to see if it makes an improvement.

I've been playing around with that Antique Sound Lab preamp, and though it is not in the same league as the CJ preamps in audiophile terms (but not too far behind), it just has SUCH literally hair-raising timing (as so many of the ASL pieces have) that it has become my premier beloved preamp: when it plays MUSIC (even with digital!!), I just start to melt, to shiver, to experience that long-lost (since the ARC SP-8 days) Kundalini Effect!!! Caveat: according to the dealer here in town, you have a roughly 50-50 chance it will blow up on you. But I've always had good experiences with ASL gear. Now to roll the dice on an ASL Typhoon :-). My dealer will have a heart attack.

Anyway, I'll soon also have my Sony 2250 set up in one of my Giant Direct Coupled plinths, that same beastie which I reported on a while back trampled the legendary Technics SP-10 MKII underfoot (but not a Lenco, using the same RS-A1/Monster Cable Sigma Genesis 2000 - currently the mind behind ZYX - on each ;-)). In addition, the Sony, which has an absolutely superb main bearing (clearly better than the Technics), DOES respond to power conditioners, quite well, further improving things. I'm thinking of putting an Oracle mat (hard metacrylate, not so heavy) on the Sony platter. Will report on THAT combo in the near future, before starting on the Rek-o-Kut.

So, have an equal amount of fun, laddies and lasses.

Johnnantais wrote:

" So, for those who own Garrards, it might be something to try to get a step-up transformer - assuming you have the "original" European wheels - and try this out to see if it makes an improvement."

If one is in the USA or Canada or anywhere else where the AC line frequency is 60Hz, the "European wheels" (assuming he means "motor pulley") are not necessary. The rotation of the motor is primarily dependent upon the line frequency. It would only be necessary to change the position of the links in the voltage changeover block to adapt a Garrard 301 or 401 to 220V-240V/60Hz. The idler wheels do not differ between 60Hz and 50Hz, or 120V/240V.

I might suspect some difference between 50Hz and 60Hz operation, though. At 60Hz the motor is spinning 20% faster, perhaps increasing the "flywheel effect" of the motor's armature.