Building high-end 'tables cheap at Home Despot II

Jean,
Interesting developements! You have taken a route that I been thinking about too. However I have recently decided to go into an other direction, namely to drop the Lenco topplate altogether. I intent to have a new topplate lasercut from 5mm thick steel that is totally flat and will be glued to a ply/mdf sandwich. I hope this way you solve all the damping issues in one go. I am still working on this and don't know the cost involved yet, but I do know that most of the cost involved will be the programming of the lasercutter, so if more people would be iterested in this maybe I can order a small series instead of just one and prices will drop dramatically. More on this will follow!
Peter

Hey Jean,

Glad to see you back. An interesting post - as always.

I did something similar on my stalled G99 project that may be of interest to the fellers. You can now buy a semi-solid two part epoxy that looks kind of like a candy bar. You tear off a chunk and knead it with your hands - which mixes the two parts. I used one from the auto parts store that is supposedly made to stick to steel. I was a little more conservative than Jean and just applied it in two spots around the rim of the top plate of the G99 - afraid of overdamping as Jean implies. (I know the Despot also sells a version of this stuff.) It may be easier to apply than liquid but I wouldn't be surprised if it has slightly different damping properties. There is another version on the Lenco heaven site where a guy used lead shot captured in Epoxy on his G99 - again one would expect different damping properties.

Of course, you dont get the benefit of patching the holes on the L75 type top plates. Come to think of though, my G99 arrived with an extra hole - I used a small autobody repair kit that included some metal screen material to back and fill it before repainting the G99. Looks stock now.

I was reading through the old thread yesterday, as captured on the Lenco Lovers site, and was amused to read all the objections and caveats regarding the Lenco's ultimate performance that people still felt back then - around page 14-16. Even the guy who I bought my G99 from said it was inferior to both his Garrard 401 and Techniques DD. When I got it I instantly noticed that it had an old worn out plastic idler and no Lenco mat. I can only assume that it probably wasnt tested in a plinth according to the "recipe" either. Although it generally looked beat to shit, it has the tightest bearing of all my Lencos.

Mike

Peter et al, It seemed to me when I saw a cut down Lenco top plate for the first time that one could fairly easily replace the Lenco top plate with aluminum sheet. I have worked 6mm Al sheet at home and making small holes on a drill press is a cinch.

The hardest thing to reproduce on the Lenco top plate would be the slot for the ider arm - you would need to carefully secure the Al sheet and use a router with a straight cutting bit and jig. The Large hole for the wheel could be cut by a jig saw and Bob's your uncle.

However, Peter if you go forward with the steel idea I am sure that some of us here (me) would like one too and would be happy to help defray the cost. Now the question - which would sound better Al or steel?

Mike

Hi Mike & Peter,

Gotta wonder whether the idler arm speed channel would get burred up over time with aluminum - not that I have much need to change or fine tune speeds - but I do use Peter's Post for idler wheel disengadging all the time - even to swap records.

But whatever material or design, I'm interested.

- Mario

My plan is to use steel because of its higher mass. the plan is for a 50x50cmm 5mm thick steel plate that will weigh aroung 8kg. It will have place for 2 arms one of which could be 12" or 9".
I plan to replace the idler adjustmentment with something simpler. You lose the disengagement possebility, but I haven't used it for while anyway and so far I cannot find any disadvantage. I know Jean said sometime ago the disengagement wasn't really neccessary.
I will try to post a picture of what I have done so far.