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I guess I'm old since I'm staying home to work on this instead of hitting some hot new years parties...Got the L37 maybe 20 years ago for way under $100. Was given the free solid plinth from another inmate TubAV. Internet research said it had the horrible "Death Cube" motor (far right) version, which vibrates so bad it ruins everything.
Took the wind out of my sails and it all sat on the shelf.
Fast forward 20 uyears later I decided it is time to start converting all my old shelf projects to working tables I could use with the SG4 power supply. I have all these papst 3 phase motors I collected over the years. Time to put this old iron back in service.
At first my plan was to use what I thought was my good condition spare HS20.65-4 far right. Friggen beat. Too bad though, glad I checked (grr eBay) one opened winding. Dammit. That aint going to work.
Luckily I had that HS14.50-4 (middle) as a spare too though I think it was for a belt drive or something because I had to drill out it's top plate to get it to fit the idler mechanism.
Oh well. In the end it wont be as cool as I was hoping. Saving my working HS20-65.4 for an even cooler ROK project but this HS14.50-4 will sound good too. I understand some ROK were shipped with this motor so maybe it is the more natural fit anyway.
By the way, what sorts of tonearms sound best with these idler tables?
Edits: 12/31/24 12/31/24 12/31/24 12/31/24 12/31/24Follow Ups:
An RB250. AND a Gray Research 103 SL.
I think I'm saving that Gray for something else though.
Maybe a a RB-250 won't be too terrible? Should I find something better?
This youtube video suggests it probably wouldn't end in complete silence.
I used an RB250 on all of mine with an appropriately thick armboard to achieve correct VTA. If you look closely at that video I believe that plinth is a hollow box which I feel like is the wrong approach for ROK.
Your plinth is multi layers of MDF and plywood, much more dense to cut down on vibrations/rumble.
Find a Grado-
Thanks for posting. I'm assuming you are referring to those old school wooden c-channel arms. Not that I'm not curious, like with the Gray, which I was very tempted to try, I'm hearing what you are throwing down....but the lowest cost wooden Grados are several hundred dollars on eBay.
Not that I wouldn't be willing to step up to spending on something like that if for example, what I already have on hand could only possibly result in dismal failure. In this case the goal was a budget build with the side benefit of cleaning unused junk out of my closet and turning it into something useful. A couple bits of data suggesting maybe the RB250 might not be terrible. Sounds worth trying anyway.
Maybe if my RB250 experiments go too horribly, Grado woodys will be back under consideration.
I use two Grado tone arms:the original metal one and their least expensive wooden one. Both are on separate VPI turntables--- To my ears with the Grado Cartridges they sound pretty much the same. So do not drive yourself crazy--Sometimes I use an Ortofon moving coil cartridge which I like a lot..
Never tried a Sota turntable
Oh yeah. I would definitely use the multilayer plinth you sent me. Too cool not to.
I have been thinking about trying out one of those VTA devices for Rega arms made by Pete Riggle but I don't know if it would give me enough adjustment to not need another arm board to shim it to the correct height.
you might look over at the Michell engineering site for a VTA adjuster. They were selling a modified rega single post arm, named the techno arm , and sell a VTA adjuster for that single post rega arm design. the modifications did not change the mounting post .
Cool. It's also inexpensive. Interesting that these are not all just knockoffs of one another. Now I need to figure out how they each work so I can form an opinion about which one I might want to try. It is too bad they don't have the manuals posted. Especially with this one, I'm not sure how it is supposed to work.
I wouldn't want to give you bad advice, so it mitigates be best to contact Fidelity hi fi, a U.S. seller of two of the adjusters.
it might be just a trick of the mind, human hearing is so subjective, but with the modern tip shapes, combined with various thicknesses of records , I find that for critical listening, a sweep through a small adjustment range instantly reveals the sweet spot, where things just sound better.
because of the unreliable nature of critical hearing, I had to mark my adjuster to prevent going far off a reasonable adjustment range , If I missed hearing the sweet spot as it passed the first time, through either lack of attention , or trying too hard.
I normally don't go to that trouble to just play a record, but for critical listening, I feel adjusting the vta is a nice option . of course, a sceptic would be correct to say one also has to adjust the tracking weight and anti skate but I just want to play a record, not run a science experiment .
my particular table , the Michell gyro allows me to twist the top threaded collar , and reach under the plinth to secure the arm locking nut from underneath, so have no need for another adjuster. it was interesting to learn which amount of tightness sounded better , because real tight was not just right.
Don't know if the Riggle one is worth a $200 plus price premium. Though it does have a tone of really great reviews.
Some type of VTA adjustment mechanism seems a much more convenient way to go than pulling everything apart and trying different size shims until you hit the sweet spot, especially when vinyl thickness comes in all over the map.
That second one looks good and the right price. If I recall most of my little armboards were about 3/8" thick. I always tried to do just a smidge of "taildown" on my VTA.
Mount the Gray and enjoy original Caruso performances as they meant to be heard but something is telling me yore in world beating mood and plan all out assault on SOTA and still have some money left for Burgerking breakfast deal.Yire in the right place indeed
I'm saving the Gray for another, cooler, ROK G2 project, I plan to tackle soon. The G2 will probably be my coup de gras idler build. This is a warm up. Of course, I also have a very nice set of Garrard 401 parts sitting there waiting for me too.
I don't know if I'll ever be anywhere near world beater but the idea was join in on some of the DIY fun, and save some of this neat old stuff from the landfill.
I just wanted to verify the RB250 is "enough" arm for the job or should I go looking for something better. Overkill sounds perfect to me. I paid almost no money for it and it has just been sitting in a box unused for around 20 years. Sounds like it fits the bill perfectly to me.
Glad to see you're moving on it! Correct me if I'm wrong but Papst motors that ROK used for their belt drives spun in the wrong direction for their idler TT's. You may have one of the ones they used on their idlers. I converted my old L-37 to a Papst motor with the help of Tubesforever (RIP)
I bought that L-37 years ago on Christmas day on ebay for $17 when no one was bidding. Sadly, I got rid of it and have a Lenco now. I wish I could find another L-37 or L-34 without paying the ridiculous ebay prices. Have fun. Post a pic when you're done.
Hey man. There you are. They go for alot more now days, even with the death cube, that is for sure. This stuff is far too cool for the landfill. It needs to live again. I love the look of the old refurbed tables people like Tubesforever (RIP) post on here.
I hadn't heard that about the belt drive vs idler tables running in opposite directions. If that is true it should be be a bit of wire swapping to get the direction reversed.
My plan is to feed it a signal from the SG4 , a DIY multiphase power supply I linked in my first post. In my case, I'll set it up as 3 phase with 120 degree phase difference. This eliminates the faking cap and these papst motors run ultra buttery smooth and sublime when you feed them a true three phase sine wave. It should just be a matter of getting everything wired correctly. Knowing my luck it will undoubrtedly run backwards first time I try it and I will end up rewiring it. One cool thing about the SG4 is you can change frequencies electronically. It should be illustrational to see if there are any differences between running on the differnt pully sizes vs shifting the frequency to get the right speed.
I'm glad you understand all this 3 phase stuff. I do not. I just remember subbing out my old death cube for a Papst belt drive ROK motor and switching out the drive hub and the turntable ran backwards. That's where tubesforever bailed me out.
Haha. It gets easier if you have the 3 phase supply. There are only the 3 motor wires to worry about plugging into the supply. If it goes backwards , that just means you need to hook it up the other way. The thing with the L37 is there needs to be a way so all 3 phases get simultaneously activated by the big control knob/switch if I don't want to add a seperate power switch. An extra power switch seems lame since that isn't how it fuctioned from the factory. I think I could just have the equivalent of a contactor for each winding with some spare relays that would probably fit up in that plinth cavity.
I believe Vinyl Engine has the manuals, which have the factory wiring schematics, if you want to wire it up with the capacitor, and not have it run backwards (lol). The motor just does what you tell it so all you have to do is wire it up as shown in the schematic of the model you would like to emulate.
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