2020 update : JC Verdier La Platine

@mr_gray 

Your hearing is fine. The Verdier has a very relaxed quality to it which can easily be lost with mods. The supplied rubber belt is very poorly made, it is out of round ( cross section ), rough, and in my experience you can see it riding up and down the platter as the platter rotates. A fellow user local also has this problem. The Leonardo rubber belt is better made ( more true ), it's as simple as that.

I used the supplied linen thread which I preferred to the rubber. I would not use cotton ( stretches ) or dental floss ( too waxy ) both of which I have tried on my reference TT and were failures.

On my reference turntable ( 26kg platter ) I use surgical silk. If you use low tension you can chalk it but I don't.

I don't see why you should lose anything with a better motor as long as you run the belt with low tension. However my guess is that the Sota Eclipse motor is closer to the original in drive, just more accurate.

As an aside I sold the Verdier tp a friend who had a SME20 - the Verdier was significantly better than that TT.

I am having some great results with the la platine.  i think it sounds pretty great.  it is a very transparent platform i think.  where i am at is as follows:

- tiny thread being used.  i think this is cotton but not sure.  motor as close as i can get it.  i'm having very good speed stability and i am easily making speed.

- i haven't gone back to footers and i don't think i will.  it's going well on the springs.

- i tried a grade 3 ceramic ball.  it is 10 mm.  turns out the ball i had was 12 mm.  ceramic sounded ceramic.  i've gone back to the steel.

- using very light synthetic oil with the ball in place i measured wow of 0.02% rms and got speed variation down to 0.15 rpm.  it sounds fabulously speed stable.

- in trying the 10 mm dia ball i found my magnets are so weak that the platter sits flush on base.  i have ordered magnets which are very slightly smaller than the existing ones.  i am hoping i can get a little more magnet suspension into the equation

- in running a table that to a significant degree has weight on bearing as i am, i think it sounds that way.  less gossamer and more "plastic".  it honestly sounds alot like the garrard sometimes albeit with alot more music and resolution.

- the table has tonnes of jump/dynamics and bass.  but you do have to potter with it to have it at its best.  my tonearm i am using now is a fr64s.  not having vta adjustment is killing me as each change i make with ball/platter "suspension" implies vta out of whack.  i am sick of getting microscope out.  i do think the platine allows ear adjustment like no other table i have heard.  it is just so pure to what is occurring.  i have ordered a vta adjustment mechanism and can't wait to be able to optimise on the fly so to speak.

@mr_gray 

For those of us who do not use the ball, the clearance between the two magnets is about 10-11mm. 

I have tried Colton thread to terrible effects. The ones I used were almost wool threads. Both the viscose and silk threads are good. @dover mentioned the Eclipse motor system from SOTA. I wrote to Donna @ SOTA, and she confirmed that the motor works with thread drive. A previous poster from France with a Nouvelle La Platine used the SOTA motor. As SOTAs are suspension type TT, the Eclipse may be a good alternate.

On the other hand, Thom from Galibier has developed a motor for his own design as well as for Verdier. Though he is adamant that his motor only works for non-suspended TT. He recommends defeating the suspension on the La Platine, and use Kapton flat belts. His motors have been used on La Platine. As opposed to the SOTA motor which employs a feedback loop, The Roadrunner, the Galibier runs ‘nude’, so to speak. 

Your enthusiasm for the La Platine is quite infectious. I have taken more relaxed attitude towards the La Platine, preferring to just enjoy the music it produces. But you have force me to maybe take up a few projects on the La Platine to further enhance its abilities. 
 

BTW, I have had problems with signing onto Audiogon, so I changed my user name. 

I am wondering whether the Eclipse system including the Roadrunner speed monitor can be used with the Verdier, because the Roadrunner depends upon a Hall sensor that "reads" a tiny, weak magnet that rides on the underside of the platter. Thus the huge magnets that levitate the platter and would be in the vicinity of the Hall sensor may interfere with accurate reading, AND the Hall sensor and magnet where they pass over each other require a total of more than 10-11mm of space between platter and base for clearance (referring to the previous post that mentions the width of the space between magnets. You might want to consult with SOTA on this question before proceeding with purchase.  If it’s a problem, there may be ways to get around it.

@lewm 

The sensor would be placed on the underside of the aluminum alloy platter which overhangs the magnets by about 4cm. The actual magnet sensor is approximately 5mm. If it is placed close to the edge of the platter, then there would be a 3.5cm clearance from the two La Platine magnets. This  may be enough to avoid any disturbances, but it really has not been tested. 

@xdr wrote about his experience with the Eclipse on the La Nouvelle, the baby brother / sister of the La Platine. The Nouvelle does not use magnetic repulsion on the platter, so his application of the Eclipse motor had no problems.