AR ES-1....To clamp or not to clamp??

I think the Michell clamp should work on the AR and I'm sure there are others...

Plato is right on the money. You have to use something that is very low in mass. As you know, the ES-1 does not have much of a suspension, so be careful what you spend your money on.

I set one of these tables up for my Dad and experimented with it for a bit. I had an old Michell clamp laying around and tried that. I didn't really like it too much. I tried one of my spare Sota Reflex clamps and it was much too heavy i.e. the more that the suspension "sags", the less isolated the system becomes. In plain English, this clamp was just WAY too heavy for the suspension of this table.

Sota also makes a small low mass clamp called the "I Clamp", so i dug around and found one of these for sale on the net. While they cost more than the Michell when bought brand new, they can be found relatively cheaply on Agon or the other audio websites. Compared to the Michell, i thought that the Sota I Clamp worked much better. There might be some other alternatives out there, so let's see what others might have to say. There are quite a few tables that have a suspension that is close to that of the later AR's. Sean
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Sean, thanks for the information and the links. I bought George Merrill's last acrylic platter with a lead mat and I'm going to try to find a a used I clamp in my browsing. Please keep a lookout also and let me know if you run across one.Thank you for your interest and help. Peace, Lee

Don't laugh but one the best clamps is an old plastic one that used to be sold by Radio Shack.
It is lightweight, turns down nicely and is about as non-resonant as you can get.
But I still tweaked it. I put a slab of Dynomat on it!
best
bob charlanza
reading, pa