It's a rise of probably 25 degC, certainly not a couple of degrees, and I wont be using a thermometer or thermistor to effect measurements to show the change anytime soon. At least not without an appropriate forwarding of consultancy fees.
Transfer them all to your computer and make up a playlist for each session?
But even with my slow starting Thorens, it is up to speed by the time you position the pickup over the start groove and lower it. And even if you can't remove a disc from a spinning turntable, surely you could put it on one?
I'm trying to work this through here. I can't get my fingers between the foam mat and the disc. Many of my discs have square or rounded edges, not bevelled.
OK, I'm not as bad swapping discs while turning as I was a month or so ago and it seems it is specifically the foam surface which is grabbing my fingers before I can get my nail under the edge. It will probably be much easier in lifting and centreing if I were to use a wool felt, but I'm not certain whether the reproduction will be as close to the original as the foam I am using right now. In any case, the foam was an experiment and needs to be lifted and replaced with something neater in the long term.
With a running platter, lift the outgoing record with the inbound record in the left hand while holding the pickup head in the right hand. Place new record on centre and needle on record. Doable, but
20% of the time the outgoing record ends up on the floor instead of in my lap.
That'd take weeks. What if become enlightened and decide that a ten quid cartridge is surpassed by a thirty or hundred quid cartridge? What if I decide a paper board, polystyrene, cork or leather offers the best playing surface? Hmmm , leather sounds good.
Yes I can. It was surpirisingly easy to find the method once I'd closed my eyes.
Ah - right. That explains it. I did at one time play records for a living (as it were) and got quite adept at swapping them. But of course didn't take much care in those days. I'd have a box of the same ones to pick between. ;-)
That's the original mat, except it had an aluminium ring underneath the playing surface for a 7" . It took me a little while to decide the reproduction problems with 7" were in part due to this decorative ring. When I removed the offending trim saxaphones sounded like they do live, there was no thought "Is that a viola?" Filling the gap between the black rubber and the disc with thin foam meant many previous records I thought of as poor were uplifted as distortion on loud vocals was removed and breathing became apparent. Actually this last part was also down to using a lower compliance stylus with conical tip and with the headshell weighted up with 1/2 oz lead so the pick-up represented something more like what was used with the early
45s.
This thin foam I have been using has put the audio quality of the 7"
45 above that of a 12" 33rpm, even the outer 2" after deep cleaning. It has improved the quality of reproduction of the 45s so that they exceed the performance of the digital copies aired on BBC FM radio. As there are nutcases willing to spend a fortune on equipment, I'm keeping the source of my foam under my hat. No. it's not a fungal infection. ;-)
Th funniest thing is that I spent YEARS trying to get an arm and cartridge to track a piece of 'Electric Ladyland' that always came out distorted.
Then I got the CD, and guess what. Its distorted there as well :-)
Think that was the death knell for my Hi Fi aspirations. If the bastards cant even record it properly what is the point of £20,000 of playback fidelity.
Then I went into some recording studios ' hey that hi-hat is overloading the tape mate' 'no its not, the needle is only just in the red' 'yeah but what about the peak to mean ratio and the pre-emphasis' 'Fuck off smart ass: whose got the job here, you or me?'
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