Garrard SP25 arm won't travel to centre

[valve lover]

Sp25 was my first proper TT.

My Dad had an SP25. My first turntable was a Garrard AP76.

From memory the last version of the SP25 was actually belt driven.

[_D_S_J_R_]

Absolutely right.

My first proper turntable was an AP76, which sadly was a bad 'un. Others I saw were far better made and finished and the one I have now is delightful, with a very quiet drive, arm way better with higher compliance cartridges than its flimsiness would suggest (currently tracking an ADC XLM III with great success) and with a cork mat plonked on the stock one (and 'wedge' in use in the cartridge carrier), it sounds really involving after a stripdown and clean/de-lube of the trip pawls and mechanism in general!

The thing with Garrard is that the basic designs were good, but the Plessey bean counters used to force cost-cuts it seems. All through the late 60's to early 70's, Dual decks, even the most basic ones, were so much better engineered with decent close tolerance platter and arm bearings and the stock steel platter on my 1214 has metal almost twice as thick as that used on the Garrard equivalents. The top Dual models were in a class above again and IMO still very serious vinyl players. Garrard weren't to be defeated though with some of their better models, as the belt driven SB models were much better tolerance where necessary and much refined where needed for low tracking weights, despite still using the old high speed four pole synchronous motors. Sadly, Garrard lost track in the mid seventies and either made decks looking like Jap ones but not as good and at the other end, made some really nasty autochangers based on a tiny model they did (CC10) which remain unloved to this day.

ALL old Garrard auto decks and a good few Duals now, suffer from dried up grease which has the consistency of araldite glue now and to return to the OP, the trip pawls on Garrards were oiled too, when they actually give far better performance used totally dry and clean.

[Apprentice]

This one just throws them out the side

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hkHxXL4jebE

Are you on some sort of LP abuse site?

[Dr Bunsen Honeydew]

They are Shellac 78s, they will take loads of abuse, apart from dropping on the edge as they will shatter.

[wallace]

They are Shellac 78s, they will take loads of abuse

Mine didn't fare to well,when my sister sat on them....