Turntable problem, my vinyl woes continue . .

domflane

Alright, after my last post about finally getting into two channel, I've been pretty busy. I couldn't get those nice Dual TT's that were in Miami, but I did find what seemed to be a decent deal on an Audio Technica AT-PL50 for $50 and it was local. The guy plugged it in and the table spun but he didn't have any way to play it, so I took his word and grabbed it. I got it home and hooked it up to the phono stage on my HK and it sounded terrible, a loud hum and the woofers in my Monitor 5's were going crazy. So, I hooked up a POS Soundstream that my dad let me borrow up to the HK to make sure it wasn't the receiver and the hum was gone, although the sound wasn't great. (I'm sure this was just the record player, you should see this thing . .) So I figured I just needed a new stylus which I got on ebay for $17, no problem. Got that today and it's still all messed up. Same loud hum and loads of distortion. Another funny thing happened, I left the table spinning and turned off the receiver and I could hear the Beatles coming out of the TT . . thats not normal is it? Forgive me if this is crazy newb stuff, but I'm 24 and I barely remember cassette tapes, let alone LP's.
So what can I do? Replace the cartridge, buy a new table, throw it out the window? I hope I didn't get a lemon, but I have a bad feeling I did. Any help would be greatly appreciated . .

Dominic

nooshinjohn

sounds like a grounding issue.


Does your TT have a ground lead? If so, it must be connected to the appropriate ground location on your receiver. MM or MC could also be a factor.(moving magnet/moving coil) and also cartridge output may be problems as well.

What are the specs on the cartridge and your phono section?

jimbo1421

Regarding the hum, there should be a separate ground wire from the turntable that attaches to a ground connection on you receiver. If that is missing you will need to replace or improvise one. If it is properly connected then you might have a bad connection somewhere between the cartridge and your phono input. The cartridge connection is a highly likely suspect as well as the connection between the headshell and tone arm. Those latter connections may be spring loaded and sometimes don't pop back into contact when reattaching the headshell. I sometimes have to poke at mine with a pencil tip to get them to snap into contact. Also try disconnecting and reconnecting the little cartridge wires. A little bit of oxidation there can make a poor, noisy connection.

Good luck,

Jim

Zitro

The hum definitely sounds like a ground problem, easy enough. Is your cart a MM or MC? Your phono stage might only be MM compatible; MC's are very low output usually. As far as hearing stuff with the receiver off, I have no idea lol.

nooshinjohn

Zitro wrote: »

As far as hearing stuff with the receiver off, I have no idea lol.

happens on my rig too if I am close enough to the turntable...

domflane

On a brighter note, I hit the thrift store record jackpot the other day. I've been checking them a lot lately with meager results but this was pretty rare. I got
The Beatles - Sgt. Pepper's Loney Hearts Club Band
The Beatles - Yesterday and Today
The Beatles - Something New
The Beatles - Rubber Soul
Janis Joplin - "Janis" Motion Picture Soundtrack
Janis Joplin - In Concert
Peter Frampton - Frampton Comes Alive!
The Doors - The Doors - super minty
John Lennon - Imagine - with the poster and in the plastic
Fleetwood Mac - Fleetwood Mac
BeeGees - 1st
BeeGees - Main Course
Four Tops - Four Tops Live
Simon and Garfunkel - Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme
The Rolling Stones - Flowers
Plus some Neil Diamond records and a few others all for $1 a piece. They're all in amazing condition and must have all been donated by one person. Most of them are originals and were printed in the '60s. This is by far the best haul I've made, now if I could only get a turntable to work I could listen to some of these . .

domflane

Theres definately no ground wire coming from the TT itself, just the pre-attached RCA's and the power cable. Its really loud too, maybe its the phono stage, but even with the junk TT that I tested a have to run the receiver about -30 db's less on the volume knob.

Zitro

domflane wrote: »

On a brighter note, I hit the thrift store record jackpot the other day. I've been checking them a lot lately with meager results but this was pretty rare. I got
The Beatles - Sgt. Pepper's Loney Hearts Club Band
The Beatles - Yesterday and Today
The Beatles - Something New
The Beatles - Rubber Soul
Janis Joplin - "Janis" Motion Picture Soundtrack
Janis Joplin - In Concert
Peter Frampton - Frampton Comes Alive!
The Doors - The Doors - super minty
John Lennon - Imagine - with the poster and in the plastic
Fleetwood Mac - Fleetwood Mac
BeeGees - 1st
BeeGees - Main Course
Four Tops - Four Tops Live
Simon and Garfunkel - Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme
The Rolling Stones - Flowers
Plus some Neil Diamond records and a few others all for $1 a piece. They're all in amazing condition and must have all been donated by one person. Most of them are originals and were printed in the '60s. This is by far the best haul I've made, now if I could only get a turntable to work I could listen to some of these . .

Wow, that's awesome. I haven't had nearly that much luck with records at a thrift before. Good find :cool:

hearingimpared

The ground wire needs to be connected to your tonearm then to the ground post, usually, just under or above the phono inputs on your receiver. Without this ground wire you will get all kinds of hum, pickup all kinds of RF and EMF noise, maybe even local radio stations. If you look underneath the turntable you may see a lug or a connector of some type at the base of the tonearm. If so, you can take a length of wire and connect it to the tonearm base and run it to your grounding post on your receiver.

Dawgfish

domflane wrote: »

Theres definately no ground wire coming from the TT itself, just the pre-attached RCA's and the power cable. Its really loud too, maybe its the phono stage, but even with the junk TT that I tested a have to run the receiver about -30 db's less on the volume knob.

Dominic,

It sounds you are having two issues. One is the lack of ground as you found out and the others have eluded to. This is causing your hum more than likely. The second issue is more than likely you are having a compatibility issue between your phono stage and your cartridge. This is probably why it sounds really loud like you say it does. Is your phono stage swithable between moving magnet(MM) and moving coil (MM)? When you say that it is really loud it sounds to me that your phono stage is switched or setup for a low output moving coil cartridge (there are high output moving coil cartridges also) and you are running a high output moving coil or moving magnet cartridge on your table. Check the HK and see if this is adjustable. If so, set it to the Moving Magnet setup.

If this those not solve the problem, you'll either have to try a different cartridge that is compatible with the H&K or try a different phono stage. If this is so, considering that you paid $50 dollar for the table, and it's probably already going to cost you another $50 or so to fix the ground wire problem if you can't or don't feel comfortable doing the repair yourself, plus the cost of another cartridge and/or phono stage, I would really consider selling your table and picking up something else. It may save you a lot of hassle down the road. You can often find used Technics SL-1200s for anywhere from $125 to $200, and if they have been taking care off, will be a much better starting point. I'm not knocking your table, just trying to save you some grief and money going down the road.

P.S. Great score on the LPs!
Steve

hearingimpared

Dawgfish wrote: »

Dominic,

It sounds you are having two issues. One is the lack of ground as you found out and the others have eluded to. This is causing your hum more than likely. The second issue is more than likely you are having a compatibility issue between your phono stage and your cartridge. This is probably why it sounds really loud like you say it does. Is your phono stage swithable between moving magnet(MM) and moving coil (MM)? When you say that it is really loud it sounds to me that your phono stage is switched or setup for a low output moving coil cartridge (there are high output moving coil cartridges also) and you are running a high output moving coil or moving magnet cartridge on your table. Check the HK and see if this is adjustable. If so, set it to the Moving Magnet setup.

If this those not solve the problem, you'll either have to try a different cartridge that is compatible with the H&K or try a different phono stage. If this is so, considering that you paid $50 dollar for the table, and it's probably already going to cost you another $50 or so to fix the ground wire problem if you can't or don't feel comfortable doing the repair yourself, plus the cost of another cartridge and/or phono stage, I would really consider selling your table and picking up something else. It may save you a lot of hassle down the road. You can often find used Technics SL-1200s for anywhere from $125 to $200, and if they have been taking care off, will be a much better starting point. I'm not knocking your table, just trying to save you some grief and money going down the road.

P.S. Great score on the LPs!
Steve

Great point on the phono pre settings Steve. I would think, however, that a receiver would just have a MM setting on it but you are correct if it does have an MC setting and is boosting the gain on a possibly already high output MM or MC cartridge. Just thinking out loud.

jimbo1421

After joining Vinyl Engine you can download the manual here:
http://www.vinylengine.com/library/audio-technica/at-pl50.shtml

I looked through it and see no mention of a grounding wire connection. I am not sure what else to recommend to you besides checking all the other connections.

Jim

thsmith

Not sure but it looks like this TT has a built in pre-amp

Might try turning it off or use an analog in on the HK

madmax

domflane wrote: »

Another funny thing happened, I left the table spinning and turned off the receiver and I could hear the Beatles coming out of the TT . . thats not normal is it?

The Beatles live inside the vinyl, don't let them get away!
madmax

domflane

I just tore the thing apart and I'm still pretty confused. I found a small screw in the bottom of the cartridge and removed it, this allowed me to pull the cartridge off of the tone arm. The screw went through a rectangular metal piece that was soldered to a small black wire. I'm guessing that is the ground. I followed the black wire and it was soldered to a circuit board with one or two more wires from the cartridge . . . makes me think its not the ground. Who knows . . I do know that you're not supposed to remove the cartridge, all the wires running through the tone arm are soldered inside it. The whole thing seems really cheaply put together, its all plastic and the wires are really small, so knock away Steve.
After I put it all back together, I tried it again and still the same . . barely any sound but the loud low frequency distortion and the woofers excurding like crazy. I sure don't want to damage my speakers, so this thing is done unless I can perform a miracle . .
Consider me on the hunt for a new TT. Thanks again everyone,

Dom

domflane

Built in pre amp huh? I saw an on off switch and that didn't even cross my mind. If its in there, it must be small, because I took the whole thing apart and there wasn't much circuitry. Thanks guys

domflane

That on off switch was under the plate, but that was it. I never guessed that it could be that. The volume is back to normal too, two pre amps wasn't doing me any good apparantly. It sounds surprisingly good and the table is running really quiet. Don't know what I'd do without this forum. Thanks again

domflane

Yea, I didn't expect much for $50, it was kinda just something to hold me over. I'm still on the hunt for something better.

jimmydep

Outstanding technical support Mike!!!!! Nice job

Dawgfish

Aweseome! I'm glad you have it up and running and sounding good now! Good call folks on the built in pre. Enjoy the vinyl Dominic. It's very addictive.

Steve

hearingimpared

Great call Tracy. My experience with the low end tables is very limited. I'm a plain old manual bare bones audiophile turntable guy so I think in the simplest terms. LOL!!!

thsmith

Just got lucky, actually Jimbo posted the link for the manual which had the info but hey, sometimes it takes a village

Dawgfish

Keiko wrote: »

Not exactly a high end table. The PL120 I had was OK, but after getting my Technics SL-1210M5G, I haven't looked back.

+1 on the Technics SL-1200. Dominic you'll be hard pressed to find a better used table for the money than a 1200 since your looking. Get a good used 1200, add a Sure M97 cartridge or even better a Denon DL-160 cartridge and you'll never look back either. Until then however, enjoy what you got, especially since you got it sounding good.

One more thing since it looks like your well on your way towards becoming a vinyl addict like most of the rest of us, do a search on some of the vinyl cleaning threads on the board. It's priceless info that will get your vinyl in great shape. You can have the best turntable and system on the planet, but if your vinyl is not in good shape or clean, it's not going to sound worth a darn. You've got some nice LPS there, so get em sounding there best. Just my dos centavos.

Steve

hearingimpared

Dom, check this Rega table out. It is a steal for $200. The MSRP is between $900 and $1100. You won't need to do any upgrading for quite a while.

http://detroit.craigslist.org/wyn/ele/1655085465.html

domflane

That table looks nice for $200, unfortunately its in Michigan and I'm in Florida. Maybe I'll contact him to see if shipping is an option although shipping something like that makes me nervous. There's a Technics pretty close to me, an SL-B200 that needs a step ring.. $40. But I don't want something I'll have to work on. Since my table is working, I might use the $200 that I would spend on a better one to jump on some SDA's when they come available. I've seen a couple pairs over in Tampa recently, but they dissapear from craigslist before I have a chance to do anything. It's hard to decide what to upgrade first when you have a tight budget . .
Thanks again for all the help guys, I would have never guessed that table had a built in pre amp. They sure hid the switch well, I had to take off the belt and the plate to get to it.

hearingimpared

domflane wrote: »

That table looks nice for $200, unfortunately its in Michigan and I'm in Florida. Maybe I'll contact him to see if shipping is an option although shipping something like that makes me nervous. There's a Technics pretty close to me, an SL-B200 that needs a step ring.. $40. But I don't want something I'll have to work on. Since my table is working, I might use the $200 that I would spend on a better one to jump on some SDA's when they come available. I've seen a couple pairs over in Tampa recently, but they dissapear from craigslist before I have a chance to do anything. It's hard to decide what to upgrade first when you have a tight budget . .
Thanks again for all the help guys, I would have never guessed that table had a built in pre amp. They sure hid the switch well, I had to take off the belt and the plate to get to it.

If the owner has the original box and packing material for the Rega, RUN, DON'T WALK!:D

domflane

How does the SL-1300 compare to the SL-1200? I've seen a few on CL locally.

Dom

domflane

I'll contact him if its that good of a deal, thanks