I grew up listening to vinyl records, both albums and 45s. I loved the sound of the music, and I still have memories of sitting in my room, listening to my favorite albums over and over again. In 1982, I traded in my turntable for a Philips CD-100 compact disc player. At the time, CDs were the new trend, and I was eager to experience the improved sound quality they promised. But I eventually realized that CDs lacked the warmth and depth of vinyl. I still have a lot of my old vinyl records, and I recently decided to get back into playing them. I’m looking forward to getting my old records back in rotation and enjoying the full, rich sound of vinyl once again.
I went to the attic and retrieved my old turntables. Unfortunately, the drive belts had deteriorated with age and I need to replace them. Also, I’m researching which turntables and cartridges to replace my old equipment and get the best sound quality from my records.
It was a bit of work to find drive belts for my turntable until I finally found them on the Amazon and Walmart online stores. The drive belts I purchased fit both my Sony and technics turntables.
I bought this Sony turntable in the 1980s to match my Sony AM/FM receiver/amplifier’s remote. I believe the turntable still has the original Empire cartridge, which is a P-mount, moving-coil type. I’m not sure if the cartridge is still good, but I think it is. I’ve never had any problems with the turntable or the cartridge, so I guess they’re both in good condition.
This semi automatic Technics SL-B2 was my first “real” piece of audio equipment and I remember my excitement when I first opened the box and installed it with my Craig ‘all in one’ stereo system. I used it for about ten years until I replaced it with the new Sony automatic turntable. When i took it out of storage, the belt was totally disintegrated and stuck to the bottom of the turntable chassis. Other problems were the cueing system was frozen in the raised position and I noticed the strobe light for the speed adjustment was burned out. but I replaced the drive belt and I slowly spun the platter, This reset the cueing system, which now seems to work well. I also rebalanced the tone arm and set the anti-skate dial.
Down the Rabbit Hole
I retrieved my old turntables from the attic and basement and I was excited to find them, but unfortunately neither one is working. However, my album collection is in decent condition and should be playable. I purchased replacement belts for the turntables, but that did not fix the problem. I then downloaded the service manuals for each player, and now the turntables are sitting on my workbench in the basement awaiting further repair. I am hopeful that I will be able to get at least one of them working again, but the repairs seem complicated. These are delicate mechanisms, and I am not sure if I have the skills to fix them.
I examined a Technics turntable that had been sitting unused for some time. The cueing mechanism was stuck in the raised position, so I tightened the adjustment screw to lower the tone arm (which turned out to be a mistake!). Unfortunately, when I tested the unit, the tone arm just skated across the record. The turntable is now on my workbench for a more invasive diagnosis. I bought and set up a new Denon DP-300 turntable. While doing so, I learned some tips that I then applied to setting up my Technics SL-B2 turntable. The SL-B2 is a semi-automatic turntable with a tone arm that returns to the rest position at the end of the record. To set it up, I first loosened the cueing arm which I had previously overtightened by mistake. Next, I moved the tone arm to the “end of record” position, where it would return to the rest position. Finally, I slowly rotated the turntable platter until it caught and returned the tone arm. The next step was balancing the tone arm, which I did by setting the tracking weight to 2 grams. I guessed the right value, but 1.5 g to 2 g is a reasonable range. I then set the anti-skate dial to 2 and adjusted it while playing a record to 3. It appears to be working, but I haven’t tried it with my stereo system yet.
I recently replaced the drive belt on my Sony turntable. Unfortunately, after replacing the belt, the speed control on the turntable no longer works properly. When I switch the speed between 45 and 33 rpm, it doesn’t switch correctly. Also, the turntable is spinning too slowly. So, it’s off to the workbench for further diagnosis and repair.
Options
Although I am going to try and fix what I have, I decided to buy a replacement turntable to replace the more than forty year old, non-functioning units
Denon DP-300F Fully Automatic Analog Turntable with Built-in Phono Equalizer – So after a bit of hand-wringing, I selected this Denon DP-300F turntable. Some set-up was required but it gave me some ideas to try when I work on my legacy units. i wanted the fully automatic model that was easily upgraded. I don’t want to babysit a manual turntable, so fully automatic was a must. It also has a balance weight and adjustable anti-skate. The included Denon cartridge is adequate for my purposes although I may eventually upgrade to an Ortofon 2MR Red cartridge. That said, I am happy with the Denon unit “out-of-the-box” so upgrading now is not in my budget.
But the rabbit hole gets deeper as I retrieve my record collection from storage in cardboard boxes and milk crates