Thorens TD 146


I found very little info on the 146. Much more on the 145/147. The tonearm looks a bit different than the 145 arm. I assume this a good performer for the money, going for $300-$600, depending on condition. My guess is it doesn’t reach lofty heights until the tonearm swapped out to a Jelco, SME, ..... I have an opportunity for a very clean one locally.

fjn04

They have an auto stop. I swear I've never seen one. I've seen the clutch that was suppose to help with sudden stop, it could be the auto stop. I've replaced a few of those. The clutch fails or is broke off. 

I guy just fixed one of those too. He's pretty thrifty.. Added an after market shaft and aftermarket clutch I think. Maybe he'll chime in..

Thoren is the Bomb. Great decks. I have a 2030 that is pretty friggin' nice too.

Still like a 121 or 124 better they have a break for Queing and speed control for recording.

Russco are Garrard killers.. Look at one of those, they have a gear shifter, (no kidding) and a washing machine motor. :-)

We load the rabbit every now and then. He's a good sport. He'll stay on for a while then BOING!

Regards

hvy:

The earlier TD145 had auto stop, but I don't recall it lifting.

There was a TD147 in the shops around the time the TD146 was new, but other than a different arm I don't know the difference.

I heard the TD146 in the early 80's (I think) when visiting my folks in Iowa and saw the new TD147 when I got back to LA.

I still had 2 TD160/Sme combos that cost very little so didn't go for it.

Also, as mentioned, auto stop didn't interest me back then.deKay

@dekay Yes the 145 has the autostop and auto lifting feature.

I have one in my storage unit and it is darn near perfect.

I bought a TD146 in, I believe, 1984 and used it for about 25 years. The TP-11 MkII tonearm was a bit different than I was used to seeing on Thorens tables. Instead of a removable headshell, the tonearm on the 146 had a removable wand (TP-63) with integrated headshell and the anti-skating was adjusted by moving a string-suspended weight, instead of a knob-selected setting.

The 146 had an auto-lift and shut-off mechanism which utilized an optical sensor that sensed the faster arm movement in the lead-out groove. This generally worked well unless the record had been stamped off-center. I had two LP's and quite a few of the large-hole 45 RPM singles that were stamped enough off-center that the arm would lift before the last song was finished.

It's likely that there was an adjustment that could have corrected this but it occurred so seldom that I lived with it.