New turntable break-in?


Everyone talks about the 'burn-in' time required for:-
Cartridges
Cables
Valves
Amps
Speakers

I've never heard anyone talk about the 'burn-in' required for turntables?
Here is a complex electro-mechanical device that spins on a bearing.
If ANY component should have a 'break-in' period, I would have thought the turntable was a sitter?

The reason I'm bringing this up is that I've had my new Raven AC for a month now, and every day the sound changes.....it gets BETTER.
When I first set it up, it sounded positively awful....no bass, no transparency, no soundstage.....in fact it sounded like the speakers were wired out-of-phase.

Every day that passes, it responds to more tweaking of the arm/cartridge combination (alignment, VTA, VTF etc) and the bass, depth and soundstage become more and ever more satisfying.
In fact, I don't yet know when it will stop?

Has anyone else experienced this phenomenon?...and if so, why is it not mentioned in the audio reviews?
128x128halcro
I believe you. SME tables have this in manual. Bearing's need time to run in. And we're not even talking the electrical stuff with the internal tonearm wires that we all know help...
Yes I have experienced it and believe it to be a combination of table, arm, cartridge, interconnect and input into the phono preamp and hence to the preamp itself.

All breaking in at different rates to different degrees, depending on the complement of components.

And no two set ups will be alike in the rate and quality of break in, even if they share "identical" manufacturers and models.

Fascinating, fun and enjoyable.
I guess it doesn't get much mention because It's hard to tell how much is break-in and how much is tuning. On the one hand, the platter bearing, the belt, the tonearm bearings, and the cartridge suspension are all breaking in. At the same time, the cables are running in and charging up, or whatever suits your cable theory. And at the same time, there is user tuning, playing with all the things you mentioned and more--VTF, VTA, tracking alignment, azimuth, leveling, platforming, isolation, damping... So with so many simultaneously changing variables, the scientific method goes out the window and all you can do is wait, listen, tweak, rinse and repeat.

I'll tell you this: I share your experience on a more prosaic, inexpensive level. I got a Technics DD turntable at the beginning of March, and at this point I don't think anybody would have guessed it could sound the way it does now, which is to say rhythmic, dynamic, involving, organic. When I asked my wife, she admitted she never dreamed the turntable I pulled out of the box in March would sound the way it does now (in a good way).