VPI Speed Problem

Johnbrown has obviously never heard Lenco-done-right by Oregon or Jean Nantais. I have had one of Jean's two-armed monsters for at least 2 years. I used to have a VPI TNT. "Nuff said.

My, seems there are others who haven't heard Lenco-done-right.

Stew in your ignorance, John. And continue making YOUR stuff up. Maybe you can even find my old TNT out there somewhere to buy.

Okay, mea culpa (my wife says hi). Your own recommendations up top seem sensible, though I would replace the white lithium grease with a drop or two of Mobil 1. Yeah, I know Mike used to recommend the grease, but they also recommended Slick 50 for a while and that stuff turns to GOO.

Another recommendation, straight from VPI, is to clean the belt and then boil it (no kidding) for 30 seconds or so before putting it back on the table. I've heard various boiling times; Mike told me 30 seconds.

Frankly, though, the OP reminded me of what a lack of pitch stability sounds like. My SDS appeared to be dead-on, speedwise, winter and summer, as tested with a KAB strobe, but there was still something wrong. It didn't bother others and I tweaked the hell out of the TNT. I've already mentioned what "fixed" the problem for me.

Okay, yer a smart guy. But if your turntable changes speed depending on whether or not the stylus is in the groove (my Lenco sure doesn't; I just checked), I'd say you have a dumb turntable:-)

Nope, not a bit. My KAB strobe tells the story. Why should a mere 1.5g (or whatever) alter the TT speed?

Hey John, watch that blood pressure. Deep breaths.

Just thought of something and had come back to amend the post. If some turntables slow down under a monstrous 1.5g load of stylus drag, doesn't it stand to reason that they'll slow down even more during congested, full orchestral passages? And maybe speed up when playing serene new agey stuff? How do you compensate for that?

Honestly, it had never occurred to me that a TT would do what Rebl208 suggests it may.

Without pursuing the laughingstock thing (readers can figure that one out for themselves), I'll say only that the thread began with an plea by the OP to understand why his turntable "sounds slow all the time." Seems to me that I'm not the one doing the "highjacking."

Now froth away, John.

Here's what I did. I turned on the TT and let it run for 10 minutes or so. I
put on a record. I don't use a weight or clamp, so that's immaterial. I put the
10" KAB strobe disc on top of the record. I checked the speed of the TT
using the strobe disk and its light. The speed was dead-on at 33 1/3 rpm.
You with me so far?

Then I put the stylus into the lead-in groove. You understand, I hope, that
placing a 10" disk atop a 12" record allows 2" of record to
be available for this. I checked the speed again, with the stylus in the groove.
It was exactly the same as before.

Over to you.

Edit: I guess I should note, if you are unfamiliar with a Lenco, that its speed
is infinitely variable from 16 to beyond 78 rpm. Thus it is simple to adjust its
speed using the strobe. The TT is plugged into a PS Audio P300 power plant
(regenerator) providing a steady 60 Hz.

Thanks for the bone, I guess. My 12" tonearm has no provision for anti-skating and the shorter arm on the same table is used without anti-skating. I've done the CD/LP comparison in the past before I got the KAB strobe. It's a pain in the neck and I found that the spacing between tracks was dissimilar in some cases, rendering the whole thing inaccurate.

We have now gone WAY off the track. My apologies to the OP.