SP10 Mk II vs Mk III

John,
You wrote, "The MkIII had a SAEC SS-300 with a sorbathane "like" material on top of it. The MKII had the orignal rubber mat." Perhaps that had something to do with the across the board superiority of the Mk3. But with quasi-sorbothane on top of SAEC, it would seem that the "sorbothane" would dominate the sound picture, as compared to the SAEC.

But then you wrote, "Next, I compared the rubber mat to the Saec mat alone. I couldn't hear any difference between these two mats." Wow! They sound quite different in my system. The SAEC seems to impart a lower noise floor compared to the stock factory mats on either the Denon DP80 or the Technics Mk2A; on both, I can hear inner detail better in all frequency ranges with the SAEC vs rubber.

I am not touting the SAEC in any way over all other possible substitutes, because it is the only one I have tried. I am curious to try others. Clearly, the mat makes a big difference. However, with the direct-drive tables one must be cautious about using a (metal) mat that is very much heavier (or very much lighter) than stock, for fear of upsetting the operation of the servo mechanism that maintains stable speed. That's how I glommed on to the SAEC. It is less than twice as heavy as the stock rubber mat.

Hi Lew,

Steve Dobbins was suprised when I told him that I thought the SAEC and Herbie combination wasn't as good as the rubber mat. I think he was also surprised that I though the SAEC alone sounded about the same as the rubber mat. Steve Kaufman has a carbon mat on top of the SEAC mat and really enjoys it, so it looks like there isn't really agreement on mats. I'm not sure why.

John

Lew, not to muddy the waters but I believe there was more than one mat for the Technics. My Mk2A has the matching mat as the parts list, SFTG172-01. I saw another on a Mk2 that had more circular ribs and seemed to be lighter/less hard. I don't know if that was stock or not.

Also, does anyone have a stock Mk3 mat to compare part numbers against the one above?

I also have an AT-666 stabilizer (metal) mat that Raul recommended. I'm long overdue in trying it due to continued delays with a proper plinth for my Mk2A. Hopefully not much longer now.

Pryso, I had both a MkII and a Mk2A for a while. You are quite correct; there is a difference between the rubber mats supplied for those two tts. The MkII mat has those fine concentric rings, as you say, and may be more flexible, made of less rigid or thinner rubber, compared to the 2A mat. The Mk2A mat resembles, if it is not identical to, the rubber mat supplied with the Mk3. (I also have the correct original mat for my Mk3; it is not warped, but I expect to be using something more like the SAEC, based on my listening tests with the Mk2A and DP80.) Problem is also that my Mk2A mat is NOS, was never used and therefore warped a bit during storage. There must be a way to flatten it, but that is what motivated me to shell out money for the SAEC mat, which came highly recommended by Raul.

John, This business of piling one mat upon another seems a bit odd to me, unless it is to build up the mass to match that of the stock rubber mat, which is a good idea. I really like the Boston Audio Mat 1 on my Lenco, but it is way too light to use by itself on a Technics, due to possible effects on the servo.

Lew, wild guess here. On Vinyl Asylum there has been some discussion of boiling rubber tt belts to restore original tension, apparently as recommended by VPI. I'm wondering if you could boil your warped mat in an appropriately sized pan to see if the rubber "remembers" its original shape? You might begin with three minutes in boiling water, then try longer times in one minute increments to see if that does not fully do the job. I can't see how this would hurt your situation and it might help.

Good luck.