Simple & Cheap Way to Cut Turntable Vibrations

If you want something that won't end up with squished balls and won't roll off the table/stand, here's a little DIY project that costs about $10

For Diagram See DIY Isolation Feet and scroll to bottom.

Initially I just used two-sided tape to hold my balls in place on the washer, but I've since used epoxy to attach them - no rolling away any more :-)

In place of sorbothane you can use silicone sheet - i.e. a silicone oven glove from any $Dollar store. If you can't get Ball Bearings, while you are in the dollar store pickup some glass marbles.

I currently 1.25" marbles as my turntable feet - stole them from my nephew :-)

I use this in conjuntion with my
DIY Isolation Shelf Tweak

Hope it helps

Lewm - you are absolutely right - I don't want the turntable to move sideways - I want it to stay motionless while the stand is vibrating.

So, the hi-fi stand has a sideways component to its vibration (i.e. music induced vibrations) the ball bearing/sorbothane will absorb it by moving ever so slightly under the turntable dissipating the energy, leaving the plinth staionary.

The sorbothane also takes care of virtical vibrations

It works very well for heavier Turntables like mine.

I do get a faint thud if I stamp my foot on the floor, but even kids moving normally in the room has no effect.

I tried the squash balls for a number of years, but they never come close to this method for isolation.

Of course there are serveral commercial variants available if you want to spend more cash - like
- Iso-Pod Isolation System
- Vibration Isolation (ball Bearing) Damper
- Vibropod
- etc...

You do have to "tune" the system to the component
e.g. when I first heard how well one layer of sorbothane worked I figured two layers would work better - WRONG. It sounded aweful, so I settled on one layer of 1/10" sorbothane for my turntable feet.

Heavier items like amps might do better with silicone sheet, but the gear I have works well with sorbothane.

I found ball bearings worked better than cones, because the cone anchored the foot, whereas the ball has no point so it does not act as an anchor.

Anyhow - Back to the music !

Here's some commercial products...

FIM Platinum Isolation Bearings
Symposium Rollerblocks
Rollerblock Jnr.
Isobearing

Designed not to roll away :-)