Thorens TD-165 Restoration Made Easy

[MikeT.]

I just completed my TD-165 upgrade to the TD-160 Super using an upgrade kit from Vinyl Nirvana (no affiliation)! Spectacular results!! I had been doing some upgrading here and there and had replaced the motor with a NOS one from Switzerland. Also purchased a NOS TP-11 tonearm and the performance was better, but not great. The other thing that had always bothered me was the scratches on the soft aluminum top plate. I added a replacement from VinylNirvana (VN) in addition to the upgrade tonearm kit.

The Jelco TS-550S is superb. I owned the SA-750 on a previous table and the 550, with the better head shell supplied by VN, it was a no-brainer . The VN aluminum arm board is really well made and beautiful, I might add. The Jelco is a straight drop-in, almost too easy.

I managed to install the Jelco arm and rebalance the suspension using Dave's videos. I think the Jelco 550 arm is a steal. I loved my 750 and the 550 is no less an arm and with the arm board sooo easy to install.

The old soft aluminum top plate came off easily with a stiff putty knife and determination. The new replacement went on smoothly with a minimum of “nerves”. I’ve loved a suspended table since my first Thorens several years ago. The TD-165 restoration went really well. The table was purchased locally and was in pretty good shape cosmetically. With the new arm kit it now sounds fantastic, better than it looks.

I took some before and after pics and hopefully can post them here without too much trouble.
I had been hunting and hunting for a vinyl solution that didn't cost me an arm. I think I lucked up with the timing of the upgrade kit, the new Jelco 550S tonearm. Well worth the price, time and effort. Highly recommended.

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[MikeT.]

Made Easy might have been an overstatement. While the Jelco TS-550S is indeed a drop-in with the kit, there is still the matter of getting the Thorens suspension correctly set. I’ve been at it for weeks, not that it didn’t sound good, it did and does but I couldn’t get it to the proper bounce and evenly spaced from platter to top plate, until a few days ago.

The secret, at least for this project, is start from the point where the arm board is laying against the top plate. Slowly, deliberately begin tightening the nuts which tension the springs. Get it @ 6mm high and don’t go much further, which was my mistake in previous attempts which resulted in over tensioned springs and the inability to rotate them properly to set even bounce. Once I got two sides (10 and 2 o’clock) to bounce evenly, I rotated the third spring at about 5:30 little by little until it began to bounce fairly evenly. I get about a 7 to 10 second bounce now and it sounds wonderful.

I have some new music now too, so it’s good.