penkosey
Well-Known Member
A friend of mine was recently jonesing for a turntable. He lives out of state and we were communicating back & forth about different Craigslist and Ebay ads in his area. I think he got impatient and just randomly picked one. Fair enough. So, now he has a Technics SL-220 belt drive turntable heading his way any day now. It has a Pickering D8E cartridge (with brush) installed, of unknown condition.
I imagine when it arrives he will be calling me with questions. As I mentioned, he lives far away; if he lived nearby, I'd go over and help with basic stuff like balancing the tonearm and cartridge alignment if necessary. I don't think he's familiar with those concepts. The last turntable he had was a close-and-play linear tracker.
Anyone familiar with this particular turntable, any possible idiosyncrasies to watch for, or just general maintenance, etc? I'm guessing a lot of this comes down to how well it was packed, how safely it arrives, and how accurately it was set up to begin with. I've attached the auction pics below, and I immediately notice that the tracking force appears to be set at less than 1g, which seems low, although I'm not familiar with this cartridge. That makes me wonder if my friend is going to need a crash course in tonearm balancing.
Regarding cartridge alignment...I'm curious if the original owner knew what they were doing. Although impossible to accurately judge from pictures, can anyone who is familiar with Technics turntables hazard a guess if this cartridge looks to be mounted in the right ballpark location within the headshell? Looks to me like it's sitting right in the middle of the two slots. I'm hoping it's where it needs to be, because I'd hate for him to have to dive into cartridge alignment...
Also regarding the cartridge--is the D8E any good? Should he raise or remove the brush? Or get a different stylus or cart altogether?
Thanks for any input! I don't know where this particular turntable is on the Technics food chain. I was under the impression that their Direct Drive models was where they really shine...I've never seen a Technics belt drive.
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I imagine when it arrives he will be calling me with questions. As I mentioned, he lives far away; if he lived nearby, I'd go over and help with basic stuff like balancing the tonearm and cartridge alignment if necessary. I don't think he's familiar with those concepts. The last turntable he had was a close-and-play linear tracker.
Anyone familiar with this particular turntable, any possible idiosyncrasies to watch for, or just general maintenance, etc? I'm guessing a lot of this comes down to how well it was packed, how safely it arrives, and how accurately it was set up to begin with. I've attached the auction pics below, and I immediately notice that the tracking force appears to be set at less than 1g, which seems low, although I'm not familiar with this cartridge. That makes me wonder if my friend is going to need a crash course in tonearm balancing.
Regarding cartridge alignment...I'm curious if the original owner knew what they were doing. Although impossible to accurately judge from pictures, can anyone who is familiar with Technics turntables hazard a guess if this cartridge looks to be mounted in the right ballpark location within the headshell? Looks to me like it's sitting right in the middle of the two slots. I'm hoping it's where it needs to be, because I'd hate for him to have to dive into cartridge alignment...
Also regarding the cartridge--is the D8E any good? Should he raise or remove the brush? Or get a different stylus or cart altogether?
Thanks for any input! I don't know where this particular turntable is on the Technics food chain. I was under the impression that their Direct Drive models was where they really shine...I've never seen a Technics belt drive.
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