Thank you for your responses - I took the weekend off from obsessing over my turntable so didn't see your posts until today.
The stylus is there and it is clean - inspected it under a loupe and used Zerodust to clean it. I improved the sound a bit by adjusting the gain on the pre-amp/phono stage but the sound is still not good. I am not sure how to test the tubes to see if they are bad - don't have a tester of any sort and don't have any spare tubes to see if a different tube would sound better. I do have another phono-stage I can try in order to eliminate the phono-stage as the culprit.
I actually emailed Chris of Teres about the bearing oil, but it has been over a week and there has been no response; apparently Teres Audio customer service isn't what it used to be. I am not sure how to go about checking the bearing oil - mostly, I am not sure I have the strength to move the turntable to where I would need to in order to work on it, let alone having the strength to pull the platter off (I think that is what you have to do with the Teres - it has been a long time since I put this turntable together!) How does the bearing oil affect the sound? The platter revolves smoothly and quickly reaches the correct speed, so it would appear the oil is still OK. Or is it just a good idea to replace it when the turntable has just been sitting for a few years?
The stylus is there and it is clean - inspected it under a loupe and used Zerodust to clean it. I improved the sound a bit by adjusting the gain on the pre-amp/phono stage but the sound is still not good. I am not sure how to test the tubes to see if they are bad - don't have a tester of any sort and don't have any spare tubes to see if a different tube would sound better. I do have another phono-stage I can try in order to eliminate the phono-stage as the culprit.
I actually emailed Chris of Teres about the bearing oil, but it has been over a week and there has been no response; apparently Teres Audio customer service isn't what it used to be. I am not sure how to go about checking the bearing oil - mostly, I am not sure I have the strength to move the turntable to where I would need to in order to work on it, let alone having the strength to pull the platter off (I think that is what you have to do with the Teres - it has been a long time since I put this turntable together!) How does the bearing oil affect the sound? The platter revolves smoothly and quickly reaches the correct speed, so it would appear the oil is still OK. Or is it just a good idea to replace it when the turntable has just been sitting for a few years?