The Talking Machine Forum — For All Antique Phonographs & Recordings

Dear all,

The turntable place is never fully horizontal when mounted. One of the sides is slightly above the other. While this cannot be noticed in the music, I can notice a "sinusoid" kind of amplitude variation of the needle's friction noise on the background. The turntable plate is perfectly horizontal when I put it on the floor. This might mean that the problem lies with he motor's position inside the box.

Is this normal in most gramophones, or is it a real problem? Can it cause extra record wear?

Regards,
António

I'd expect playing your records at a non-horizontal angle would cause more wear than otherwise.
If your turntable stays at the same angle during rotation, and doesn't wobble on its own I'd first check to see whether your motor should be mounted to the motorboard with or without some spacers or washers of some sort. I had that problem with a messed-with portable I bought, and it was missing one of the three spacers. Finding a replacement took care of the problem.
If your turntable wobbles, however, they I'd suspect either a loose fit on the turntable shaft, or a bent shaft itself. I've not had good luck in straightening these; I've done better replacing the shaft itself, as in the case of an Edison disc machine.
Hope this helps!
Bob

barnettrp21122 wrote:I'd expect playing your records at a non-horizontal angle would cause more wear than otherwise.
If your turntable stays at the same angle during rotation, and doesn't wobble on its own I'd first check to see whether your motor should be mounted to the motorboard with or without some spacers or washers of some sort. I had that problem with a messed-with portable I bought, and it was missing one of the three spacers. Finding a replacement took care of the problem.
If your turntable wobbles, however, they I'd suspect either a loose fit on the turntable shaft, or a bent shaft itself. I've not had good luck in straightening these; I've done better replacing the shaft itself, as in the case of an Edison disc machine.
Hope this helps!
Bob

Well, it doesn't wobble. The higher position is only at the same angle. There are some rubber spacers. I'll will check the spacers and screws. Uff...

In fact, in my gramophone there are 3 screws that can be accessed below the plate. These screws secure the motor compound to the deck. The fact that there are only 3 screws (not equidistant from the center), automatically leads to one side not being lifted, and so the opposite side (which has a screw) is always a bit above. The screws were all very tight. I've loosened the screw on the uppermost side. With this I got a more leveled position, but it's still not fully horizontal. Anyway, I've seen some close-up videos of gramophones playing and the plate always wobbles a little bit: the soundbox is always going a bit up and down. So I guess that in its new position my gramophone's plate is fairly normal and it does not even wobble so much.

Regards,
António

I've recently started cutting my own thick leather washers to use instead of rubber. I find leather absorbs any motor noise just as well as rubber, but because it doesn't compress like rubber, it's much easier to keep the motor level with the underside of the motor board, which in turn keeps the turntable level with top side of the board. Provided the leather is of uniform thickness and you use the same number of washers per screw, you can just tighten the screws & everything sits evenly, but with rubber you either have to tighten the screws as far as they'll go and the rubber reaches it's compression limit to keep it all level, or you have to muck around trying to get a firm even tension on all the screws before maximum compression is reached.
You just have to remember to use enough washers so the overall thickness of all the washes on one screw, are appoximatelt the same as one of the rubber washers in it's compressed state.
If the replacements are too thick, you may end up with the turntable scraping the moror board or hitting other components., and if they're to thin, the turntable will rise leaving a big gap between it and the board, or the brake may no longer be in line with the edge of the turntable.

Well, indeed, now I have a problem with the brake. But the problem does not seem to be the plate position, since the edge of the plate touches the break right in the middle. The problem is that it touches it lighter than when the plate was too high on the opposite side. When the I fully wind-up the gramophone, the break does not work. It only starts to work after I the springs' tension is alleviated somewhat. Is it time to replace the break? Or should I lift the plate on the opposite side, like it was before?

no, you just have to move the felt/leather pad closer to the turntable edge, you should see a metal ring wrapping around the pad but not connecting to the other edge, like getting a key ring and cutting a slot it in where you can bend it out, just bend this ring out and push the pad out closer to the turntable, i hope that makes sense, it is hard to explain, if it doesnt i can send some photos showing you what i mean
Alex

kirtley2012 wrote:no, you just have to move the felt/leather pad closer to the turntable edge, you should see a metal ring wrapping around the pad but not connecting to the other edge, like getting a key ring and cutting a slot it in where you can bend it out, just bend this ring out and push the pad out closer to the turntable, i hope that makes sense, it is hard to explain, if it doesnt i can send some photos showing you what i mean
Alex

Dear Alex, could you please post the photo? Thank you in advance!

António

here it is
it should be something similar to this on my hmv 31, just bend the metal parts, move the pad closer to the turntable then close the metal prongs again
Alex

Dear Alex,

My break is somewhat different. It's like this one:

http://uk.ebid.net/for-sale/gramophone- ... 705424.htm

Cheers,
António