LENCO - GL75 Project

[Wakefield Turntables]

Thanks, I like the look of the Alphason but they are rare beasts.

Get in contact with Jamie123 I think he was selling his??? Could be wrong but worth a punt.

[Wakefield Turntables]

Tonights Update - The Lenco Reference Pt LXIII - A review of the new Carbon fibre Idler wheel

The deck is sounding extremely well. I have had chance to review several genre's of music and listened to much music in coming
to my conclusions. The new carbon idler wheel that I installed has been a big improvement over the old "heavy 5 holed" idler wheel
that I had installed in the deck over the last year. The differences are not massive but well worth the 36 Euros that I paid for it.
The deck was a fairly even handed performer before the last set of tweaks and I would now say that the deck has changed. It's now
more ruthless in that it dosen't flatter old/poorly recorded material. Give it a good piece of vinyl and it sings give it something
less than and It'll show up the short comings very quickly. You soon learn decent vinyl over poor with this deck.

OLD STYLEE

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SEXY NEW STYLEEE

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The PRaT has also improved and now sounds very good indeed. Again, not massive but enough that you can clearly hear a little more
cohesion to the soundstage. The main area of improvement seems to be micro detail. Listening to Led Zeppelin II recently revealed
much more note decay on several tracks and then there was the magical experience of hearing something new on a beloved album that
you've not heard before. I found myself looking at the sound stage a couple of times after I realised I'd heard something new!
Listening to Public Service Broadcast latest album which is some area's has glorious 80's analog synth shows the deck has now problems
matching my Technics 1210 for precision and decay of the notes. The album has many samples from 1950's and 1960's documentaries about
the decay of the welsh mining industry and every single sample is pin-point centre of the soundstage whilst a wide immersive swaive of
sound imerses it, I hear a horn section slightly off left centre, drums dead centre, bass slightly forward to the left with accoustic
guitar slightly off centre right. I have no trouble dissecting the sound stage and easily being able to follow any instrument I
wish to follow. Bass on this album is deep and well defined, snare work on the drums is crisp.

The noise floor on all the vinyl I tested has been extremely low with hardly any hint of surface noise from the various records I
tried on the deck. The volume has been quite high so lower level listening benefitted even further with complete silence in most
instances of new, clean, well looked after vinyl. All this testing of vinyl on the current '75 leaves me with an interesting
dilemma. I have 3 MM phonostages. I have the MM stage which lives in my ATC preamp, the MM stage in my Croft Epoch amp and a MM
stage on my Sugden Masterclass phonostage. So, which is best? Well, I have no idea. All my testing has been done in the Masterclass
MM phonostage so it looks like more fun to be had with listening to more vinyl through the other MM stages, lives hard eh!!!!

I've also noticed that the deck seems to sound better at slightly lower voltage levels going into the motor. I usually like to listen
at 220V but recently I've had some very nice listening sessions between 200 - 215V going into the motor. This can't be a bad thing as a
lower voltage usually means slightly less vibration coming from the motor and then subsequently into the top plate and then into the
platter. Again this may be an area of optimising that could be exploited to get the optimum from the deck. Maybe I could spend a few
listening sessions experimenting with differing voltages and seeing which is best. Another free tweak which might get more out of the
deck! I think the improvement in sonics can be probably put down to a culmination of the new idler wheel and some more isolation around
the tonearm mounting and the tonearm pillar. The isolation I added to the on/off switch and the additional filling in of the top plate
probably does nothing but they certainly don't detract from the listening experience so I'll leave 'em alone!

As always, stay tuned.....

[brian2957]

Back on the GL75 modification trail again Andy Was the carbon fibre wheel a one - off Andy , it looks very interesting . This is next on my list http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Lenco-NEW-...53.m1438.l2649 . TBH I think the idler wheel can make a big difference to the performance of the deck .
Can you please tell me what combination of mat(s) you are using again ?
Sounds like you're getting excellent results with the modded GL75 , has it become your first choice turntable yet ?
I've decided to treat myself to a good phono stage , so have ordered a Firebottle OTP . More to come on that
The GL75 is looking very nice BTW . Did you ever get around to buying the other bearings ?

[Wakefield Turntables]

Back on the GL75 modification trail again Andy Was the carbon fibre wheel a one - off Andy , it looks very interesting . This is next on my list http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Lenco-NEW-...53.m1438.l2649 . TBH I think the idler wheel can make a big difference to the performance of the deck .
Can you please tell me what combination of mat(s) you are using again ?
Sounds like you're getting excellent results with the modded GL75 , has it become your first choice turntable yet ?
I've decided to treat myself to a good phono stage , so have ordered a Firebottle OTP . More to come on that
The GL75 is looking very nice BTW . Did you ever get around to buying the other bearings ?

Yep. Lenco modding is probably more addicitive than any illegal drugs! The idler wheel came up for sale over on LH and I don't think it was a one-of, I think they must have been produced but I'm not sure who made them, I can't help here, you'll have to do some thread digging over on LH. I agree with you fully and think that a new wheel is a must with these old decks. Most have 40+ years usage so the rubber can never be as good new and this does have a massive effect on deck performance as I have found out. The mat situation has changed again, you'll have to wait until next week for a new review of a tripple mat setup! Previously I used base mat (connected to platter) the gimp map, then a 3mm cork mat and then a Garrard 301 mat. This has now changed! The Lenco is getting the most usage but I use different decks for different music styles. I usually save the Garrard and valve system for weekend Jazz sessions, the technics for Metal and Prog, the Lenco is just such a good deck that I can happily listen to it all day and save the Cartridges and valves on the other systems! My phonostage situation has also changed. I've been listening to the Lenco via the MM stage on my Sugden Masterclass phonostage until I decided to try something a little different, mainly a Chinese EAR 834P close and I have to say I'm gobsmacked, it's one of the best MM stages I've ever heard, not the best but it's certainly up there. The Lenco and the Shure M55E/JICO neoSAS stylus setup have honestly never sounded better the bottleneck in the system was the Sugden MM phonostage. I'm now absorbing all EAR834 threads over on LH like a sponge so I think the Lenco has even further to go . The Firebottle is a very fine phonostage, I only heard the first one and there are now many newer versions which have been released and upgraded. I'd like to hear some more Firebottle stuff and is on my list of potential purchases. Cosmetically the Lenco does look better and I'm happy for the moment but I'm in the process of producing a newer design to the top plate (more in a future update)! I never did buy the new bearing, it's on the list of potential future updates.

[brian2957]

Thanks Andy . Yes you can play about with GL75s til the cows come home

I have just fitted a new mains cable and phono cable to mine . I overhauled the bearing , fitting new ball bearing and PEEK thrust pad .

Next on the agenda is the idler wheel which I linked to as I have already fitted the little idler wheel modification .

Like you the GL75 will probably keep me happy for years

I look forward to the next edition Andy .

[Wakefield Turntables]

Thanks Andy . Yes you can play about with GL75s til the cows come home

I have just fitted a new mains cable and phono cable to mine . I overhauled the bearing , fitting new ball bearing and PEEK thrust pad .

Next on the agenda is the idler wheel which I linked to as I have already fitted the little idler wheel modification .

Like you the GL75 will probably keep me happy for years

I look forward to the next edition Andy .

Is this "new" build going to be a "stock" build or a tripped out version like mine?

[brian2957]

Haven't decided yet Andy , I'm just enjoying the music at the minute . If I do decide to '' fully '' mod the GL75 I know where to look

[Wakefield Turntables]

Go on you know you want to!

[brian2957]

Hah ! I want to do a lot of things , I think I'm havin an ' old age ' crisis

[Wakefield Turntables]

Tonights Update - The Reference Lenco pt LXIV - The King is dead, long live the King ? Or is he? Er, yes he is.. 8-(

The Original Garrard 301 platter mat has been an integral part of the Lenco Reference system for the last year and it has doggedly
defended itself against all newcomers and found itself working as a team member on my platter with other mats when spinning vinyl
on the balmy summer evenings and cold long winter nights. But, it is with sad regret that I inform you all dear readers that the
king is dead, long live the king! So, how did all this occur? Well, I managed to snag a SME 3009 tonearm at a decent price and then
got a Technics SL150 turntable for free! The deck came with a rather nice platter mat and then a lightbulb went off in my bonce! The
new mat is in better cosmetic condition than my Garrard mat and is slightly thicker, probably 5mm whilst the Garrard mat is probably
3mm, certainly the spindle is rapidly being lost under the plethora of mats sitting on my Lenco platter!

Listening experiments took part over a lazy Friday afternoon with no other family member present and with no alcohol (but plenty of
cups of tea)! I'm not going to detail every single thing that happened over the afternoon but suffice to say my main findings after listening to numerous records and genre's are that the current mix of mats (Gimp/Cork/Tehcnics) has produced more of an improvement
in the following areas :-

More ballsy bass drum presentation.
Greater definition of Echo on vocals
Slightly leaner, less bloated on vocals.
Greater microdetail and ability to see into the mix
Drums appear to have more attack and sustain
Bass appears very marginally improved.

This may look like quite a marked improvement but I have to say that in the Garrard's defence it doggedly defended itself and only
just lost out, I'm talking maybe fractions, if you had to give a percentage, maybe 2-3% better??? Yep, itself a pointless
quantification as it measures nothing but I feel that the deck has slightly improved. Trust me, the Garrard mat is going nowhere and
shall still remain a cherished member of staff in my vinyl replay kit.The deck has now undergone quite a few mods over the last
2 months, a new idler wheel, a new phonostage, and yet another platter mat change. The deck is supposed to be a "Reference" and its these small improvements which keep advancing the design of the deck. There are many more small tweaks on the horizon for the deck
and indeed some rather large ones! I shall over the next few updates detail just what I intend doing to the deck. The deck has it's new anti-skate weight
installed as well and I think this could have added to the improvements I noticed. I've added a couple of photo's showing the new anti-skate weight and how the deck now looks with the new mat.

New anti-bias weight.

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The new reference platter mat.

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OK, stay tuned for more modding antics.....