LENCO - GL75 Project

[brian2957]

PS Jim, thanks for the heads up on the tweak! Please dont think the last post was confrontational.

Lol...Doesn't come across as confrontational Andy . Enjoy your beer

[Jimbo]

PS Jim, thanks for the heads up on the tweak! Please dont think the last post was confrontational.

Not at all Andy

[stevie7v]

Steve, thanks for reading the thread, hoped you like it. Now with regards speakers I prefer a heavy mass approach.

I do too.

With regards your TT I'd just make a simple TT stand for your wall. You can't argue with a few tons of bricks sitting additional tonnes of concrete footings, this is about as heavy mass as your going to get. I think the '75 really do need heavy mass with regards plinth.

Unfortunately, that's not an option for me as I can only use a partition wall unless I have a very long interconnect. I'll have to use the floor.

In theory I could removed the speed selector and the on/off switch from this current build but choose and use my nigels Speed controller and the Jean Nantais mod with the idler spring.

Is this the one where the spring is replaced by a weight on thread? Does it work?

Have you looked into Frank's DC Motor retrofit (from Lenco Heaven)? It looks interesting and YouTube videos demonstrate lower vibrations but, once again, does it improve SQ?

I agree with your methodology of try/listen/decide but it's often not easy when £$£$ is involved.

[helma]

Tonights Update - The Reference Lenco Pt XXV - El skinto Cheapo tweeks.

Well Xmas is over and my wallet is not quite as full as it was 2 weeks ago. I decided I wanted to do the base board experiment sooner rather than later. I managed to find x4 rubber feet sitting in my tool box and an old off cut of 12mm birchply. So, the idea is simple I plonked an old rubber foot under each birchply foot which lives under my Lenco 75 and then I sat and listened and made a few notes. I also did this experiment with the deck sitting on some birch ply thinking it might add an additional layer of vibration supression. Well listening to the deck with rubber feet in place sitting on the birch ply revealed a soundstage which sounded less vibrant, sucked out and generally pants. The birch ply was removed and things were returned back to normal but with the soundstage sounding just as wide as ever, maybe a little more vibrant and maybe a tad more conhesion and space between the instruments. Interestingly motor noise has always been extremely low on my deck but it now is virtually silent. The idler arm is notorious for vibration transmission and I must admit that in the past my setup has been a little off and vibration has gone throught the idler arm. This now seems to be a thing of the past. I wonder if the rubber feet have drained a little more motor vibration away from the top plate and bearing into my hifi rack? Things are sounding better than ever. So I've decided to spend a few quid on various different feet for the Lenco to see if further improvements can be made. It looks like I'm reaching the limit with regards how far to dampen the Lenco I've learned to recognise that horrible situation when you've gone too far and the soundstage goes from excellent to crap and the birchply was maybe one step too far. I'm still not fully convinced and may experiment a littl further with the birchply isolation board. Ah well, upwards and onwards........

Interested in hearing your thoughts on different feet once you get there I have three-layered feet - basically hockey pucks sandwiched between rubber foam. I thought they did an ok job, but I got around to experimenting and made additional springy feet using some low glass jars and rubberbands, basically the same idea as found on this image: http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4007/...c88f217643.jpg - the improvement was clear and interestingly 'groove noise' got more silent, which probably means there was some vibration still finding it's way through that's now been dealt with by the feet. Also there was a certain 'haze' around bass and lower midband that seemed to disappear. Never noticed that 'haze' before to be honest, only realized it used to be there after it was gone.

My Lenco is by no means a heavyweight, the plinth dimensions are 60cm x 40cm x 9cm - a 18mm bamboo layer on top and bottom and 3*18mm acacia in the middle. I also used a thin layer of acrylic mass as glue between the bamboo and acacia layers, don't know if it was a bad or good idea honestly, it was just a spur of the moment decision when putting the plinth together. I imagine the acrylic is more of an "another layer" than wood glue bond would've been. The plinth + deck together weigh around 15kg I imagine, give or take a few. It's sitting on a (too flimsy) wall shelf. Upgrading that wall shelf would be a no-brainer and perhaps decoupling it from the wall somehow. A new plinth is coming somewhere in the future, the current one was just something "quickly put together" from stuff I had available - but all-in I've probably put way more time into it and than I would've building a proper one from scratch...

I think the great thing about Lencos is they do the basics so well right out the box, providing a very musically satisfying sound and with each (succesful) tweak you get more audiophilia out of them without loosing that basic "rightness". I haven't taken mine very far from stock, I imagine it could still be improved a lot but I'm so happy with it right now can't be bothered to mess with it.

[Wakefield Turntables]

I do too.

Unfortunately, that's not an option for me as I can only use a partition wall unless I have a very long interconnect. I'll have to use the floor.
Is this the one where the spring is replaced by a weight on thread? Does it work?
Have you looked into Frank's DC Motor retrofit (from Lenco Heaven)? It looks interesting and YouTube videos demonstrate lower vibrations but, once again, does it improve SQ?I agree with your methodology of try/listen/decide but it's often not easy when £$£$ is involved.

Steve, the floor not the best solution unless it's concrete. The deck will rattle like a good'un if it's wooden floor boards or laminate, best bet hear is either a decent rack or something with lots of mass to plonk your deck on. The Jean Nantais mod is indeed the one where the spring is replaced with a small weight and a bit of fishing line. I have no idea if it works but lots of people claim that it does and good for them! I'll be sticking with the standard method of idler wheel implentation i.e. the on/off switch. It lives on a pretty rigid column of metal which should help vibration transmission, I've also dampened my on/off mechanism and there are several other mods which should further reduce/eliminate vibration getting from the top plate into the on/off switch and then back into the bearing and platter. I've not tried Frank DC's motor but I have seen it and shall be doing some research to see if it's a viable alternative to what I already have. I will say that my ability to alter voltage via the Nigel Speed Controller, a decent motor service and correctly setting up the motor isolation springs should pretty much remove all vibration getting into the top plate. Still we could probably go further I suppose and try the Frank DC motor .

Interested in hearing your thoughts on different feet once you get there I have three-layered feet - basically hockey pucks sandwiched between rubber foam. I thought they did an ok job, but I got around to experimenting and made additional springy feet using some low glass jars and rubberbands, basically the same idea as found on this image: http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4007/...c88f217643.jpg - the improvement was clear and interestingly 'groove noise' got more silent, which probably means there was some vibration still finding it's way through that's now been dealt with by the feet. Also there was a certain 'haze' around bass and lower midband that seemed to disappear. Never noticed that 'haze' before to be honest, only realized it used to be there after it was gone.

My Lenco is by no means a heavyweight, the plinth dimensions are 60cm x 40cm x 9cm - a 18mm bamboo layer on top and bottom and 3*18mm acacia in the middle. I also used a thin layer of acrylic mass as glue between the bamboo and acacia layers, don't know if it was a bad or good idea honestly, it was just a spur of the moment decision when putting the plinth together. I imagine the acrylic is more of an "another layer" than wood glue bond would've been. The plinth + deck together weigh around 15kg I imagine, give or take a few. It's sitting on a (too flimsy) wall shelf. Upgrading that wall shelf would be a no-brainer and perhaps decoupling it from the wall somehow. A new plinth is coming somewhere in the future, the current one was just something "quickly put together" from stuff I had available - but all-in I've probably put way more time into it and than I would've building a proper one from scratch...

I think the great thing about Lencos is they do the basics so well right out the box, providing a very musically satisfying sound and with each (succesful) tweak you get more audiophilia out of them without loosing that basic "rightness". I haven't taken mine very far from stock, I imagine it could still be improved a lot but I'm so happy with it right now can't be bothered to mess with it.

Hi Kai, always good to hear from you. You make some interesting points. I couldn't agree with you more with regards knowing when you've done something to the deck and the soundstage improves, sometimes it's night and day and sometimes you think you could be a trick of the mind. There is no logic as to why sometimes things work and then they don't. It's the old wisdom of trusting your ears. The mass of a plinth is probably less important than you think. I've heard that a plinth made from Bentonite clay+marine resin can produce significantly better dampening than a plinth weighing many tens of Kg's. I think my deck and plinth weigh roughly the same as yours somewhere between 15-20kg. The deck sounds great. I also think you are 100% correct with regards how the Lenco just produces things with "correct" presentation, Lenco's don't need very much tweeking and you can get fantastic results with small incremental mods.

Not at all Andy

Phew!!!

[Wakefield Turntables]

Tonight Update - The Reference Lenco - Pt XXVI - Roadmap.

I need to get a little more focus with regards how this project is going. So January is going to be the month of the Tonearm. I've been playing around with a "loosely" coupled tonearm over the last 6 months and it produces a very nice sound but I think it's high time I got series and really looked into what I'm going to do with the tonearm on the current plinth that I own. I don't have space to decouple the tonearm with the top plate and onto the plinth which is what I would like to do so I'm going to go down the route of rigidly coupling the tonearm to the top plate. Ultimately the tonearms will be de-coupled and mounted on custom made pods and then housed in a new plinth at some point in 2017. Setting up the Alphason is a doddle and I can easily get the correct tonearm geometry alignment but I can't seem to get enough clearence from the base of the cartridge when sitting parallel to the vinyl. Playing a warped record can be a scary ordeal! The problem with warped vinyl made me think about using a record weight and I purchased a 1.2kg monster from eBay. Not only does this flatten out vinyl but it should also improve the amount of rumble generated from the Jollyon bearing. I can't prove the record weight improve bearing rumble but at least it markedly decreases the chances of me knackering up my cartridge. I've read many reports from various hi-fi mags with regards bearing rumble with and without a record weight being used and most usually quote 0.1 - 0.3db imrovement, ok not much but this is supposed to be a reference Lenco so any improvement is well within the ethos of this build. Cartridge selection is also an important of the build. I'm already sold on the Denon 103M and the current Shure MM cartridge but it's the configuration of these cartridges which is important so I shall be playing around with various spacers which add mass and dampening to these cartridges to try and further improve the sonics. The idea over the next few weeks is to spend as little as possible and experiment with what I have, so I hope to finally come up with my "preferred" setup with the bits of kit already on the Lenco. I have decided that I shall not be pursuing any spring modifications, the 16rpm mod or dampening the idler arm. This lots should keep me busy in January and hopefully I should have some idea where the "roadmap" is going in Feb. As always....

[stevie7v]

Steve, the floor not the best solution unless it's concrete. The deck will rattle like a good'un if it's wooden floor boards or laminate, best bet hear is either a decent rack or something with lots of mass to plonk your deck on.

Hi.

As I said, my deck will be placed on a plenty-massive plinth and only then spiked to the floor. So far I've managed to test this using a stethoscope and it works fine.

Regards
Steve

[brian2957]

I bought a record weight and wasn't keen on it . I thought it caused a bit of 'dryness' to the sound . Probably taking away a bit of the character of the turntable caused by rumble I'll have to experiment with it again.
I was wondering when you'd get round to the arm again Andy . I'll be keeping an eye on this for a future project . Unfortunately I had to purchase another M55e which will hopefully arrive in the next few days . I can then fit the Jico stylus and the Snakewood body and take it from there .

[Wakefield Turntables]

I bought a record weight and wasn't keen on it . I thought it caused a bit of 'dryness' to the sound . Probably taking away a bit of the character of the turntable caused by rumble I'll have to experiment with it again.
I was wondering when you'd get round to the arm again Andy . I'll be keeping an eye on this for a future project . Unfortunately I had to purchase another M55e which will hopefully arrive in the next few days . I can then fir the Jico stylus and the Snakewood body and take it from there .

Horses for courses I think Brian. I just use the weight so I dont knackered up the cartridge. I think alongside the other mods that the weight works quite well and a little self indulgent bling to the project. I'm just about to go shopping for some M3 thread and other gubbins.

[Jimbo]

I have tried clamps and weights and would prefer a weight. I have noticed when you add weight you usually get a better defined bass to the sound. Curious to know what benefits if any you have found using a weight?

I must admit I use a clamp on my VPI but usually to flatten records. With nice flat 180g vinyl I usually leave it off.

Not sure how much weight the bearing on the Lenco will take but probably a reasonable amount?