Home Spindle Lube Test

"Of course, I know that someone is going to start hearing differences in the sound of the oils"

Yep, I heard a difference. Interestingly it was the lighter stuff that I found to have less bearing noise, but keep in mind the turntable bearing I'm referring to, a Music Hall table. Don't really care why and it was only audible on those quite passages. BTW, just for the record I'm not advocating that anyone use water on their bearing.

Inpep: I just went back and re-read your explanation. It makes perfect sense to me and i have nothing to argue with you about on this. In fact, i would even go further in saying that one can use too heavy of a viscosity lubricant, which would result in increased drag and / or less than expected results.

I still don't get where we are "diverging" on what we are looking for as an end result though. Isn't the goal of a lubricant to reduce external frictional losses to a minimum without introducing further drag into the equation of its' own accord? I understand about viscosity, "shearing" of oil, the use of fillers to widen thermal stability, etc...

What i'm getting at is this: If a product is the slipperiest substance known to man, and it is both thermally and chemically stable for the intended use, how could system losses or internal drag be reduced any further? Obviously, i'm taking into consideration that the mating surfaces are properly machined, etc... Help me out here, will ya? Sean
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Sean,

About "too heavy a lubricant being detrimental and increasing drag". The short answer is Yes! If the lubricant is too heavy and not pumpable, i.e. grease, it might not be possible for it to penetrate into the surfaces interface. Depending on the load on the bearing, however, a lighter lubricant might not be capable of supporting that load and we are back to direct contact of surfaces. I think, however, that grease would also be perfectly alright for lubrication in a turntable, but the drag on the drive system might be compromised.

As to the "goal of a lubricant", the main reason for lubricants is to SAVE the mating surfaces from WEAR, not to necessarily save the energy necessary to turn the spindle in the bearing. The best way to reduce the wear on the bearing is to reduce the friction between the surfaces, either by introducing a substance that fills the small microscopic bumps and ridges in both surfaces, effectively "smoothing" the surfaces, or by introducing an intermediate substance between the surfaces, thus protecting the surfaces from wear. In the first case greases, solids (graphite) and oils can be used. In the second case, various fluids are used, including air.

I am not sure about your other query about making the slipperiest substance "known" to man more slippery?

Once two bearing surfaces are protected from wear, the job of lubrication is done. The increased drag etc. is not relevant to the lubrication, but might be important for other reasons.

Back to the original arguement. First, The fact that a turntable turns longer with a particular lubricant in it is no indicator of lubricating "goodness". Second, for the purposes of lubricating our turntables, any motor oil is overkill. As I facetiously said, olive oil might very well serve the purpose of reducing wear in the spindle bearing. You might want, however, to use motor oils because there are many different viscosities available and you might want to play with those to determine if some "sound" better than others.

I shall stick to light "sewing machine" oil for my Oracle Alex III, (13 yrs old) but I am tempted to add graphite to the oil, just to see if I can "hear" the difference. It might even make a long term difference to the life of the bearing.!

Regards, Bob P.

Rockvirgo, your results reflect what I found too.

I was having a bearing noise issue with my VPI scout and I tried about 6 different types of lubricants. The one that worked best for me, was a lightweight mobile one synthetic oil.

Best for me was meaning least friction and least noise mesured by using a stethoscope on the plinth. Went with Mobile One about 9 months ago and have not had any bearing noise issues since.

Sean - I would imagine the slipperiest substance would have a tough time adhering to anything.

Bob - Seems to me the duration of spin following shut off is at least one indicator of the amount of friction involved, and thus some measure of the enhancement the lube imparts to the surfaces.

Any maintenance is surely better than none at all, no matter the lube du jour. As such, overkill is all gravy.