Hi Gene, yes, I was about to correct that. Actually, one would suspect that increased flywheel effect of the motor should improve things. But, it may also make the motor more audible, leading to some sort of "break-up"/loss of control. So, this would be a case of comparing the two - with step-up and without - to see what the effect is.
On the issue of SP10 MKII vs Sony 2250, I had already written way back that what I suspected was happening was a case of torque vs inertia. The SP10 has a much more powerful motor, and no physical system being perfect, this means the Technics platter cannot overcome the motor's speed imperfection/signature (which is quartz locking made audible). The Sony, on the other hand, has less torque (and is servo-controlled), allowing the platter to overcome the motor's signature, smoothing out any audible deviations from perfect speed. The other advantage the Sony has, like the Garrards and the Lenco, is that it can be Direct Coupled, while the Technics cannot. There are ways, however, to ameliorate the Technics' coupling, but it cannot be Direct Coupled the way the Sony can. And Direct Coupling makes a world of difference. Whatever the case, as with the Lenco back when I declared it a real Contender when the World seemed determined to dismiss it as, let's be frank, crap, so I now urge those out there to also consider this one, a Sleeping Beauty waiting to be taken seriously. Be playing with mine soon.
Finally, I see the idler wheel making serous inroads, being brought back in various forms as well as being exhumed and revived from various basements. Of course, as in the beginning, I still believe the idler-wheel system is the superior system, various statements made by even idler-wheel aficionados, that no system is superior, being unscientific and based on nothing else but faith, motivated by a philosophy/atmosphere of political correctness (i.e. offend no one). Perhaps we offend the mouse when we state, with certainty, that the elephant is heavier and more massive, but this is simple fact. Perhaps we offend the fans of steam power that the combustion engine is superior, producing superior power in a much smaller package, at lesser cost. Nevertheless, this also is true. So why balk at similar differing mechanical/engineering systems in another arena? I see many of those who argued, back in the starting days of the original thread, that speed stability had been addressed sufficiently by the belt-drive system, and that stylus force drag was inconsequential. And yet even then the best LP-spinners relied on extreme mass to produce more stable speed (and why if stylus force drag was not seriously affecting speed stability?) and extra motors to produce more torque to overcome, indeed, stylus force drag? Many/most opposed me when I declared the belt-drive the inferior of the three systems (and still do), and yet many of these now espouse the growing DD phenomenon as well. Both the idler system and the DD system produce, like the combustion vs the steam engine, far greater results for far less economic investment. A $3K to $20 K DD system, produces equivalent or superior results to a $100K belt-drive system. Why? Because, like the steam engine, a far greater amount of carefully-machined materials is required to get equivalent results from a belt-drive machine, and this is at the root of engineering: producing results to a cost. Otherwise we would all be driving $100-million trains to reach equivalent-to-combustion engine speeds (and the analogy is apt: a $150K belt-drive – simple platter driven by a motor via a belt - is equivalent to the $100-million steam train).
Maybe the DD will win the battle, but I have faith that the facts will eventually catch up to the various sources of prejudice - political correctness included - and the idler will eventually be found to have been, all along, the best of the three systems. An extremely slow-revolving motor system which, given the fact that this magnifies speed imperfections to a truly large degree, requires extensive computerized control to be workeable (DD); vs a system which relies entirely on a high-torque, high speed precision mechanical motor designed specifically for that purpose, counterbalanced by the required amount of inertia, requiring a platter which, given concentration of mass at the periphery, need be no more massive that 10 pounds or so, thus obeying the engineering aim of cost vs performance. And that's what it is all about. Furthermore, purely mechanical systems are far easier to repair and restore than complex circuitry and computerization, furthering the aim of cost vs performance (but not the time-honoured economic principle of planned obsolescence).
So, to those who love the idler sound but continue to deny years of accumulating evidence, I say pull up your britches, accept the daily-growing evidence, and join in the battle for scientific truth! Politics has no place in scientific research/investigations, and never has (though this doesn’t mean politics hasn’t contaminated/compromised scientific research/findings to a truly horrendous degree).
I keep hearing/being told that the Lenco has limits. Like the political correctness thing which, in the utter absence of evidence, offered simply as a given (like the old given that the Sun revolved around the Earth, which, actually and come to think of it, at least had some evidence to support it, that being that it certainly **looks** like the Sun revolves around the Earth) says that no one system is superior to another, being simply a matter of implementation. Where is the scientific evidence for either of these two statements (all systems are equal and the Lenco has limits)? And as written, if it costs twice as much (or more) to get similar results from system A as from system B, then, very simply, system B is superior. Likewise, where is the evidence that the Lenco has limits? Apart from the pure hearsay of those who for various reasons (none of them objective and based on evidence) keep saying this, there is no evidence. Like George Bush who, in the absence of evidence, simply kept repeating that there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, until, eventually, he was believed by a majority. So far I have personally compared my Lencos against belt-drives and other pricey machines to the $50K level, and often receive reports of similar experiences from around the world, both direct to me and on various forums. Like any recipe in a kitchen, just because someone follows the recipe, doesn't mean the same results will be guaranteed, and lesser results doesn't invalidate the recipe. That's why there are recognized levels of talent, from middling through chefs. So, the upper limits of the "regular" birch-ply/mdf Glass-Reinforced Giant Direct Coupled Lenco has not yet been found, especially in the currently belt-drive-dominated marketplace, which is how this whole thing started, and what I was aiming at in the beginning, that being the context/battle. But say the upper limits of the Lenco had been reached at the $50K level? What would that mean? Say a new Lenco was manufactured today, as it is with pressed metal chassis, eight-pound balanced platter and 1800 rpm motor and smallish main bearing balanced on a ball bearing, and sunk into a 65-pound birch-ply/mdf mass. Would it come anywhere near $50K retail? Not even close, given the standards of engineering of materials and cost of materials. So, back to manufacturing to a price, the Lenco proves the idler-wheel system superior to the belt-drive, at any rate. I not only continue to espouse the birch-ply/mdf recipe because of its extreme effectiveness, but also because the experiment is not yet finished. My own experiment that is, in which I am trying to prove the superiority of the idler-wheel drive, which so many find offensive due to the current philosophical atmosphere of political correctness (which I emphasize again is a social, not scientific application). By rushing off in a million different directions (materials, implementation, etc.), this experiment fizzles out, and we are back to that tired old canard that no one system is superior to another (tell that to the auto industry, which according to this philosophy should re-instate the steam engine), all depending on implementation. And again: you say this based on what precisely? Examine your assumptions, for that is precisely what they are. And the identification and elimination of assumptions is also what science is about.
Anyway, many will be happy, for a variety of reasons, to see me go away, including those who want to erase me from history so they can then benefit in a variety of ways. I'm a pain in the ass, I know, but it's the squeaky wheel that gets the grease/attention. By confining yourselves to out-of-the-way forums, you do not affect things to anything like the degree you do when you participate in a general forum like this one. Keep on reporting in, keep on adding -**postively**- to our store of knowledge/evidence. The idler wheel is back with a vengeance, and this would not have happened without seriously squeaky wheels, out in the public eye, in the face of the industry, on something like Audiogon.
Anyway, soon I’ll have to direct my energies elsewhere, and I’ll simply be watching from a distance (I can hear the sigh of relief), but I predict the continued inroads of the idler-wheel system, as fact and science – AND economics - finally overcome political niceties and various personal agendas. In the meantime, of course, Vive la Lenco, Vive la Idler Wheel!!
