Two-Year-Olds and Turntables...

I sounds like you already have plenty of good advice, but I'll weigh in anyway. I subscribe first to Albert Porter's approach. In my case, my audio was in a room that was off limits,and my kids surprisingly behaved.

On the other hand, I'm a little surprised to hear you say you prefer your table low. I mount mine at chest height. I really don't like bending over to position records. Were it me, I'd move it to a higher, sturdy location - possibly wall mounted as Dave suggests.

I too used the common sense rules that both Albert Porter and Bdgregory have alluded to. Teach your children well, and they will respect your property. My little girl is seven, and has never gotten into, nor played around with any of my stereo equipment, which I will point out is in our living room, so she does have access to it. (However, while she was a toddler, I did have a small indoor "fence" around my equipment until she was old enough to understand what NO meant. So for about one year, from age 2 to 3, she was physically separated from my equipment.)

Unlike Albert though, I left the breaking of my cartridge to my friend's children (ages 8 & 10) when we had a BBQ at my house. (They had never seen a turntable before, and so strummed the cantilever, of my Benz Micro Glider II, like a guitar string). Ouch! No more exposed cantilevers for me!

(Luckily, my friend came through and kicked in some money toward a new cartridge, which was cool. I now try to get cartridges without exposed cantilevers, like Shelters and Koetsus, which I prefer anyway.)

My two cents worth!

Have something at your place that the girl loves more than life itself...Hello Kitty stuff seems to be high on the must-have list these days. Then give it to the child to play with only (1) while at your house and (2) only if she keeps away from the turntable.

We use the technique of "putting things on vacation" with our kids (4 and 6) and if the object that is threatened is high status, the threat works wonders. (E.g., if you don't practice piano right now, your "weird and wild creature cards" (the boy); your "hello kitty treehouse" (the girl) will go on vacation.) And of course, follow through is everything.

Perhaps mark a circle on the floor 4 feet away from the tt with tape or something and if the kid passes the barrier, the coveted item goes on vacation. That way you don't have to wait until it's too late.

Good luck!

Rich

Thanks all!

For the time being, I've opted to go with a variation on the acrylic cover with the out-of-sight-out-of-mind principle thrown in for good measure -- a hastily fabricated cover of 1" X 8" frame topped with a piece of quarter inch plywood and a little bit cut out of the back for the connecting wires to run. Cheap enough to just pick up and toss into the garage when our granddaughter's not visiting and hopefully ugly enough to deter the fascinations of pre-kindergartners when it's in service protecting the turntable. If this doesn't work, I'll probably opt for a Target wall mount setup but have really wanted to keep the current location if at all possible due to a combination of optimum sonics and optimum visual harmony in the room

If all this fails, I suppose I'll call Dr. Laura and face the inevitable verbal lashing....lol...

I agree with "Uncle Albert". I had exposed tubes just off the floor, and quickly trained my babies to stay away from them.

"Protecting" the children doesn't really protect them. However, just like everything else in this hobby, your mileage may vary.