"Fed Up Lurker" wrote in
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"David Kennedy"
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Fed Up Lurker wrote:

If you are 100% certain you didn't buy into reviewers
of the time looking after old pals, and the mythology,
and you have exhausted options and comparisons, then if
you feel the LP12 works for you thats what counts. But I'm no fan of it,
and it's not original nor
groundbreaking. It's based on established isolation principles found in
many T/T's from the 60's and 70's, my opinion (and many
others) is it's an expensive variation of cheaper
longstanding models such as:
http://www.theanalogdept.com/td125_dept.htm

I always liked those.

http://www.retrohifi.co.uk/thorens_150.html#t
http://www.retrohifi.co.uk/pioneer_pl12d.html
And many many others.

Including

http://www.garrard501.com/rebuild.html

That was an idler wheel mechanism, a half way house
between direct drive and belt drive -
The benefits of belt drive type isolation, but idler
wheels/gears instead of a clumsy losey belt.
And with pitch intergrity akin to direct drives.

Actually, the 501 was very similar to the top Garrard changer of the day,
minus arm and mechanism. I believe the model of the corresponding changer
was the RC 88.

No way does the idler provide the same level of isolation as a belt.

Idlers are prone to "flat spots", and are extra problmatical when they
harden up because of the relatively small area that the motor shaft engages.

The purpose of the idler was speed reduction from the 1800 rpm of the 4 pole
motor to the desired speed of the turntable.

Rumble was always a problem because of the high speed of the motor. It
corresponded to 30 Hz.

One of the early refinements to turntables was the adoption of motors with
more than just 4 poles, for the benefit of the slower rotational speed. This
moved the primary vibrational mode to a frequency that was well below the
resonance of the tone arm.