Vintage DD turntables. Are we living dangerously?

Dear Henry,
Most of the contents of the long passage you quoted are utter hogwash. (1) Because the TT101 looks complex to the uneducated, like you and me, is no reason to believe it cannot be worked on by a trained professional. It is not voodoo. (2) The very same chip for the SP10s is also used in a wide variety of later production versions of the Technics SL tt's, e.g., SL1500, SL1600, etc. There are thousands of those tt's around,and one can buy them cheaply, if one really needs the chip for one's much more valuable SP10. A certain SP10 aficionado from Texas has done that more than once. Moreover, if you renew the electrolytic capacitors in your SP10 before the chip gets blown, the problem will not arise. (3) I have a Denon DP80 that came to me with a partially defective IC. I was told the part was unobtainium, as you suggest. I took the part number off the chip and did a Google search. I found at least a dozen small electronics houses mostly in Hong Kong that had a supply of the needed Denon chip. (Mind you, this chip was made only up to 1983 and only for the Denon tts, so my results were quite amazing.) I acquired not only an NOS chip for my tt but two extra ones, for less than $25, and there were offers to sell that went as low as a couple of bucks. (I actually paid too much but went with the guy who wrote the most coherent English.) It seems there are thousands of those chips out there. The only problem is that those few who need them don't know how to find them or don't try because they believe they will be unsuccessful. (4) In general, in many cases where discrete transistor parts are no longer available it is because the part has been replaced by one that is functionally superior. Bill Thalmann (one of those "trained professionals") also replaced all the transistors in my DP80, not because any were bad but because Bill knew that the newer part was superior and more reliable and would improve the function of the tt.

So, don't panic or cause the rest of us to panic. You know what is really unobtainium?.... a 1957 Ferrari Testa Rossa.

By the way, I will gladly take a TT101 off anyone's hands, to allay fears that it will fail and can't be fixed.

Yes you are!!

This is an interesting thread in that I had planned to send Halcro a PM asking who he was sending his DDs to for repair.

I once did a global search for 2SK147 (a low noise FET). At the time they were, as Lewm said, available if you searched for them. The hitch was that you had to buy industrial quanties, minimum of 100 pieces (IIRC), at whatever price being asked. In fact, there are companies who specialize in finding and stockpiling obsolete chips.

That said, I have seen techs with amazing knowledge, skill and training, struggle for months trying to fix audio esoterica from the Japan Inc heyday. So, just because we are not electronics experts, that doesnt mean repairs on such gear is necessarily simple or easy for the expert.

One thing we might do is get together and identify a tech that has the skill to fix and keep these pieces running - and then give him our buisness. Sure the original chips might die but their final function is generic. Perhaps a such a clever tech can often design a circuit to replace the dead chip from the signal and PS input to that chip to where the dead chip rejoins the circuit.
Mike

Dear Halcro, There is nothing as cruel as the thruth.No wonder only a small part of the human kind pretend to be interested in the real truth: the scientist. I want mention the assumptions about the spead of light and their reaction about possible refutation of Einstein. Refusing to except anything else is some evidence of the mentioned 'pretending'. Why do you want to scare us? From the other thread in which you are also involved it follows that there are no good TT's whatever. I was not able to comprehend the arguments but well to understand the conclusion. My only consolation is the fact that I never bought those astronomic expensive plinths nor the similary expensive TT.

Dear Lew, There is one Victor TT 101 on the German ebay for
1000 Euro and if you like to prove that you are right you
are welcome to try. Halcro warned me just in time to avoid
my temptation.

Regards,

I have to agree with Lewm on this one. I made my living for decades servicing all sorts of audio gear. I would regard it as highly unusual to see a chip failure!!

That is worth repeating: I would regard it as **highly unusual** to see a chip failure!!

Usually you see dirty switches and controls that result in poor speed regulation, electrolytic caps failing- that sort of thing.

So I would see an explanation like this as a bid for a lower price on a prospect.

Now, if you live in a tropical environment, the chips are in a little more danger, from corrosion. If you want some simple protection, you can 'pot' the chips with silicon sealer, the clear kind similar to aquarium sealer. I should point out though that in tropical environments the circuit boards in general are in great danger, so usually you have other concerns that far outweigh the chips... In non-tropical environments this is probably not an issue.

These days I do far less servicing than I used to, but I still maintain my own vintage analog synthesizers that I play in my band. They use a lot of unobtainium chips too! I would say the major force that causes the price of such ICs to rise on eBay is mis-diagnosis of other problems in the synth (usually bad connectors and electrolytics)! I see it all the time....