SP10 Mk II vs Mk III

Raul, you still have not explain how you mount your tonearm. Care to tell? I am all ears.

The Kaneta plinth addresses this issue but taking the motor out of the chassis and place it in the same wood block where the tonearm is mounted.

http://de.geocities.com/bc1a69/kaneta_eng.html

I never saw a Kaneta mod up close but only in Japanese magazines. The Kaneta approach make sense to me. I will not get into the power supply modification and I doubt that it's necessary. It might work better for SP10 Mark 1 since its power supply is not as sophisticated as Mark 2. Anyway, I don't know if any of you have taken the motor out of the chassis and if you do you will see it's bolted on a thin layer of aluminum flange. The chassis is in essence a box and it resonates. The ultimate mod would be to take the motor out of the chassis, extend the cables, and mount the motor onto a solid block of whatever material you think is good for fighting vibration, slate, wood, metal, whatever. I just feel that audiophiles who are spending thousands of dollars on a plinth that cost way more than the turntable itself should look into the flaw of the actual mounting scheme of the original design. It is one of the problems I have with typical idler table is that all these loose parts dangling under the platter and the bearing is mounted on a flimpsy chassis and then the chassis is bolted to an overkill plinth; the whole idea just turns me off. I just wish the idler wheel can be placed outside of the platter so the platter bearing can be mounted on something more solid. Notice there's a school of belt-drive tables refuse to mount their bearings on a box and the plinth is as small as possible to avoid big vibrating surface, such as the Simon Yorke or Brinkmann. The Teres idler approach makes sense to me. The SP10 is able to be mounted in such way with no problem. I intend to do that one day. Sigh,... when I have the time, of course. :) This is an exciting thread and it's great to see an excellent direct drive table like the SP10 finally getting the attention it deserves. Its' time to think outside of the Linn box. Happy building and happy holidays!

I took the motor out before. It's not hard to do at all. The motor is attached to a ribbon cable that is detachable to the pcb inside the chassis. One can get a matching ribbon cable connector and extend the cable and you can make the motor independent of the chassis. Obviously you will lose the function of the strobe light and magnetic brake. You will end up with a three piece monster: plinth for the motor, original chassis housing all the electronics for speed and on/off switching, and finally the power supply. It would look as elegant as the two piece combo but I firmly believe that's the ultimate. If you are savvy enough with electronics, you can put all the circuit boards in a customized enclosure or an amp chassis with switches.

Correction: The three piece monster will NOT look as elegant as the tradition setup.

Any update on new plinth designs or set ups in this thread?

The idea of removing the motor and installing separately from the stock chassis makes sense to me and I am more and more tempted to do that by the day. Now, I just need a way to cut a slate...

"The Golden Number" by Charlie Haden is sublime. He is one of my favorite bassists, along with Mingus, Garry Peacock, Barry Guy, et al. Let's not forget those Ornette Coleman records from Atlantic in the 60's he participated. But the recordings he did with Horizon are outstanding. Speaking of bassist, another favorite record on the SP10 for me is Dave Holland's classic "Conference For the Birds" with amazing drum solo's by Barry Altschul and Holland's bass has a huge tone. It's out there jazz so it may not be everyone's cup of tea but I love it.

The SP10 truly excels on records that exhibit bass with lightning transients and explosiveness. The key to me is that it has absolutely no bass overhang, that nagging feeling the the dynamic notes are microscopically delayed as if something is dragging its feet. And I believe the key word is drag, stylus drag. And the SP10 gives you the sense, with its tremendous torque, that the platter is spinning with complete insistence as if the stylus is plowing through the groove without breaking a sweat and mutters "bring it on". It is this effortlessness in its rotation that leaves many other turntables in the dust. I must say it is much easier to have decent sound on belt-drive turntables than direct-drive and for many people it is good enough and I don't blame them. Why the hassle? If your musical taste is wide ranging, then perhaps only a direct-drive will satisfy you and for many people that is exactly the case. Once you are used to this kind of stability and control it's hard to go back to other genres. Don't get me wrong, I love my belt-drive Empire turntables, another high torque classic, it give me the fluidity of BD and the forcefulness of DD. Alas, it is still not DD, particularly in the bass region for its dynamic range and jump factor. Let's not forget not all DD are "forceful" like the SP10, the classic Sony PS-8750 is one of the few DD turntables that actually sounds like more a belt-drive table, super smooth and fluid, with the stability and digital precision of a DD and without the clinical sound signature DD detractors complain about. I love it.

Spinning record is truly fun and I don't really have a strong preference of one thing over the other. I embrace the fact that we have so many different toys to play with and in a forum like this to share our joyful experiences with others. Let's not forget audio is not a sport, it's still a hobby, have fun! Personally, to me audio is like food. The expensive stuff offers superior and fresher ingredient but it still requires a good recipe and a good chef to make it tasty. Certain food is an acquired taste for certain eaters. Sometimes I want shark fin soup and sometimes I want chili. They all taste good to me. To ask for the absolute sound is like to ask for the absolute food. Let the critics worry about that.

There's really nothing radical about it. It's rather reversible. The motor is just connected to one of the boards via a 12-pin connector and why do you even need to take the boards out of the stock chassis? Just leave them in there and you will have three pieces of hardware acting as a record player: the power supply, stock chassis, new plinth with motor. I know, they take up space. But making plinth just for the motor will be much easier, just cut a 6" hole on the plinth and mount the motor in it. That's it. As far as length is concern, I don't see extending few feet of cable would be a problem as long as the voltages remain the same. In fact the MK3 did exactly that by removing majority of the electronics onto the power supply chassis. Kaneta in Japan has been doing this type of mod for years. In fact I believe almost ALL direct drive can be benefited from this. I had over 30 direct drive turntables of various cost, and after examining almost all can be improved by removing the motor out of the stock chassis or plinth - most of them are either made of particle board or plastic or thin cast aluminum. They are basically a hollow box with fancy wood veneer. The Monaco turntable takes the same approach by having the electronics separately and have the motor mounted on something really solid. It's funny with the revival of idler drive turntables, all the audiophiles talk about regarding these vintage gems is the plinth. But when it comes to direct drive, it's a different story. Most people only cling on to just a few models like the SP10 or SP15 due their manual operation. And if you want the automatic operation from some turntables then, obviously, they are not good choices.

Currently, I am using the motor from a Pioneer PL-L1000 with a broken linear tracking arm so I decided to use just the motor and drive electronics. Pioneer motor and bearing is first grade with their excellent Stable Hanging Rotor (SHR)inverted bearing that is similarly employed in their flagship P-3 turntable. I installed the motor on a thick butcher block with cantilevered armboard and placed the electronics in a separate chassis. And it sounds excellent. In stock form, the motor is bolted to the bottom suspended plated that is made of wobbly plastic!! What an eyesore! I also have another unit with such mod so sometimes I tape drive one another. It's fun!

Of course not all DD turntables are good candidates. I would avoid doing this with certain brands such as Sony and Denon because they use a magnetic head to pick up signal from the platter's rim for the servo system. It's do-able but it's just more hassle. Some models have the pcb attached to the motor like the Technics SL-1200mk2, so that's not a good one. But the SL-1300/1400/1500mk2 series are excellent choices for such mod due to their detachable motor and nice dynamically balanced platter, which render them a notch above the boring SL-1200 - essentially an SL1500mk2 is an SP15 minus the 78rpm speed. But their tonearm is not as good so here's the chance to try something different.

I have a broken spare SP10, parts unit, that has speed issue so I am thinking of taking the motor and platter out and install on a new plinth and let it be driven by another SP10 acting as tape drive. As much as I like direct-drive I am also very fond of tape-drive with another turntable. I've been using these dual turntable set ups for a year now and I am really liking it.

Now, that's what I'm talking about!

http://www.audioasylum.com/cgi/vt.mpl?f=vinyl&m=832368

The Steve Dobbins plinth looks great but the triangular plinth is just lovely. It would be nice to hear it as a motor tape-driving another platter since the MK3 has speed adjustment....

Yes, Albert, getting involved is one of the major fun of this hobby instead of always being lead by the nose by magazines and the so called experts. Glad to know the SP10 is in the "big boys league" instead of the doghouse.

By taking the motor out of the stock chassis really fires up the imagination, the sky is the limit. And this way the plinth plays an even more important role than before. Glad people are giving new life (and love) to these classic direct-drive turntables as the DD genre was getting very little press time for two decades.

I hope I will get to do that kind of plinth soon. Can't wait to see your new version in the future! :-)

By the way, for those on a smaller budget the SL1300/1400/1500mk2 series, which is essentially an SP15 with tonearm, is also perfect for this kind of treatment.

The stock 12-strand wires come out of the motor assembly to the connector is about 8" long. I would extend the wires by at least three feet. I have three SP10's so I plan to do this soon. The important thing is that in the stock form, the motor is bolted to an 1/8" cast aluminum and the motor just hangs there. Now, imagine the motor mount directly to a thick slab of slate or wood or whatever material you like to use, don't you think that's better than the stock form? If you use the stock chassis, I don't care how wonderful your plinth will be your motor is still bolted to a thin sheet of aluminum hanging there. Just spend the time one day and carefully take the motor out of the stock chassis and then examine it yourself and you will know exactly what I am talking about. It's not rocket science. Almost ALL direct-drive can be improved this way. And for whatever reason, if you don't like the sound, just put it back to stock form - it's all reversible. The reason I haven't done it sooner is that I don't have the tools to cut slate! I would suggest keeping the stock chassis to house all the electronics because everything is all there with the buttons and switches, why re-invent the wheel? Unless it's an aesthetic issue and you just want to play around, go right ahead!

I plan to have two SP10 set up this way so I can have one tape-driving the other platter so it can be used as direct-drive and belt-drive. Fun!

You do NOT have to take the electronics away. You are doing absolutely NOTHING to the electronics nor the switches. The motor is mounted to the stock chassis and there is a bundle of 12 wires soldered to a 12-pin connector connected to one of the circuit boards. All you're doing is to extend the wires by a few feet and mount the motor to something more solid like a slate, plywood, or butcher block or whatever. The stock chassis is acting as housing for the electronics and switches, so for the Start/Stop and speed change functions you still need to use stock chassis.

Apparently you never removed the platter out of the SP10. The platter has about 1/4" flat area below the beveled edge. If I install two SP10 motors outside of the stock chassis then I can have one platter driving the next one without any speed adjustment because they are one to one ratio in diameter and I will use 1/4" magnetic tape, something thin to have no effect on speed. I have done this experiment with two Pioneer turntables before and I prefer the sound in this arrangement than in DD mode. But DD is usually a little more dynamic though. If I have the budget when I win the lottery, I would use a SP10mk3 to tape-drive a Micro-Seiki platter, since the Mk3 has speed adjustment.

Here are some pictures from a Japanese website applying the Kaneta mod so ignore the DIY electronics but the images give you a better idea of the motor and chassis.
http://homepage2.nifty.com/~mhitaste/audiotop/audio_apparatus_page/sp-10mk2.html

The cut out hole can be between 5-7/8" to 6".

I plan to have no cosmetic embellishment. I like everything exposed, or naked if you will. :-) Not having a spouse helps. But if that's an aesthetic issue for some people, I understand. I am the kind of audiophile who ALWAYS loses the screws on an amp or preamp because I am always tinkering with the inside, such as changing caps, tubes, etc,... so the covers are always off.

I like things neat and organize just like next guy but I just can't sit still for too long so I always end up messing up the sound. LOL. However, when listening to music I am like a zen master, completely immerse myself into it, even AM radio. I guess there's a difference between listening to music and listening to sound. The day when sound and music become indistinguishable then that's the day I stop messing around with gears.

Raul, do you use any footers for the "naked" SP10 or you just let its bottom cover or belly acting as support?

Any picture you can show us?

I actually tried the naked approach before, about more than 10 years ago. I had a small piece of 3/4" particle board attached to the upper right hand corner of the stock chassis acting as a cantilevered armboard and that's it. The turntable was just sitting on the table by its belly with four stock small rubber pucks. It was pretty naked, think of a naked person wearing a right hand glove. I had an MMT arm at the time, I think.

It didn't sound all that hot because I remember later on the same arm was mounted on a McCurdy radio station metal frame type of plinth and sounded better than the previous set up. And my custom butcher block plinth also sounded better than the naked approach but I had a different arm so that comparison is probably not valid. I guess I can always try it again with a different tonearm, like one of my Audiocraft arms.

All I am saying is that I am not convinced no plinth is better than having plinth. Just from a pure physics stand point, the SP10 has so much damn torque that you would think you really need something massive to hold down the turntable to sink all that vibration. Didn't Mark Kelly tell us that Sansui experimented something like this about that return torque that's causing the turntable cabinet to color the sound? From my experience with the naked approach, the set up did have that typical Technics clinical sound so I would imagine having a massive plinth is the right approach to high torque DD turntable like the SP10. I am not sold on your approach but, hey, if it works for you, great, because that certainly saved you ton of money on plinth. But before I try the naked plinth thing again, I can't wait to mount the naked motor to a slab of slate!

One of the most amazing thing about the SP10mk2 is in the bass dynamic, its tightness and focus. NOTHING I heard in any turntable genre has this kind of bass energy and transient. The idler drive tables might have the big tone and expansiveness in the bass but the SP10 has this quality that I called "jump factor".

Play a punk record by, say, The Clash version of "Police and Thief" in the opening drum solo and you will know what I mean. The bass just jump right out with that tightness and sharp focus that can pin you to the wall, exactly how a great sounding punk record should be. Spin some speed metal such as Slayer and you feel your blood is boiling. Play a record of acoustic bass by, say, Charlie Haden's "Closeness" with Alice Coltrane and you will hear the delicacy of his plucking and tunefulness and its deep richness. Play a chaotic sounding record such as European avant-jazz group Schlippenbach trio's "Pakistani Pomade" and the SP10 can still keep its composure by separating all the individual instrumental lines amidst all the maelstrom and the drum work can make you feel exhilarated. And when I'm done listening to the SP10, I feel exhausted in the best sense because I just engaged in the music in a visceral way like no other. It pulls you into the music and it's just that simple.

When it comes to the bass, the SP10 reign supreme, for my money.

Never own a SP10mk2A, is this "A" version any better than the regular version spec wise? I know the A version is to take advantage of the advance of IC of its time so the boards are smaller and generate less heat as oppose to all discreet parts. But spec wise, does it offer any improvement or they are essentially the same thing? The question is is the A version an upgrade from the mk2? Any thoughts?

Raul, I think your choice of word of "anger" should be replaced with "anxiety". Don't you think?

Oops, sorry the Denon I was talking about was a DP-755, which does not have quartz lock, a much older unit. I gave that to a friend and it's deservedly sitting in storage collecting dust. Sorry for the typo!

I intend to experiment with the faulty SP10 unit anyway, so it's no big deal. Thanks for the response.

T_bone, I do have an SP10mk2 that spins way too fast, something like 200 or 300 rpm. Is that something I can repair by replacing all the electrolytic caps? Or is that something related to the obsolete chips? I plan to reuse just the motor and platter for a different project but if I can fix the speed problem by replacing caps, then it will be groovy! Yes, I have bought many DD tables cheap due to "not working" but mostly have to do with the arm's automatism so I simply turn them into manual turntables. No big loss, really. Anyway, if you can shed some light on this speed issue (too fast) I would appreciate it.

Since you have experience with Denon turntables, I just want to share this. I used to own an old DP-75 that is before the quartz lock era and it sounded terrible. It was thin and glassy sounding. Just unlistenable so that pretty much turned me off on Denon tables but I am sure the later qartz era stuff is much better. I pretty much abandoned any desire to buy any DD table that is made before 1975. The several pre-1975 DD tables I bought are all terrible sounding and the speed was jerky or have no torque, and they all sound like bad digital, that unpleasant jittery sound. Of course when DD done right, they rock!

Happy listening.

Yep, that's how fast my faulty SP10 spins! I could have turned that into a lawn mower.

Albert, thanks for the cap info. I used a functional power supply that I know for sure works to connect to the broken SP10 and still had the same problem so I don't think it's a power supply issue. It's something in the SP10 boards.

However, I have two extra bad power supplies that I think I need to recap so your info will come in handy. I copied and pasted it for future reference. Thanks again!

I have three SP10mk2 units with five original power supplies, two are bad that needs to be repaired. I can take care of the power supplies and I do have a service manual. Since I have experience in building tube amps and judging by the schematic, it's not that complicated. However, I am certainly no expert when it comes to integrated circuits and chips! The one SP10 with speed issue is definitely in the boards inside the SP10 chassis. Yes, it's a crapshoot. An IC might be blown or it could be a bad cap. I will attempt to fix the extra power supplies first and then move on to the bad speed unit. Fingers crossed. It will take some time as I am in no hurry as I still have two other functional units. But I don't even use them that much because I am quite happy with my other turntables right now. Thank you so much for all the information posted here and I really appreciate the help, which makes this hobby worthwhile.

Happy listening and fixing stuff!

Vantage audio in UK does repairs and upgrades.
http://vantageaudio.com/

Gallery of works done on various units.
http://www.vantageaudio.com/info/L07Drepairs.htm