HiFi Subjectivist ¦ Audio Forum ¦ NVA User Group

That'll do me.

Another thing that has come to mind, after sitting hypnotised by the six JBE discs, revolving like they do on a Michell Gyrodec, is the notion of mats and the support they give to the record.

Loads of companies used to sell expensive accessory turntable mats during the 80s as we were all encouraged to ditch our ribbed rubber mats or worse, those with loads of 'pips' sticking up out of the surface in favour of flat glass, flat rubber or (horrors) slippy felt mats.
The idea being sold to the gullible like me, with more money than sense, was that these superior mats supported the record over the entire surface rather than only at a few points.

A moments thought is all it takes to realise that this idea was/is nothing more than marketing bollocks of the highest order.
These mats will only support the record over its entire surface if said record is optically flat. Most record are anything but flat, being either slightly warped or dished, so the idea that a flat mat will provide more support than a pipped mat, such as that found on the Transcriptors Saturn, Skeleton or Hydraulic Reference turntable, falls at the first fence. A slightly warped record might only be touching the platter at three or four points, whereas a mat with quarter inch high rubber pips may be touching the same record at 20 points as the distance of the pips above the mat and the distance between them might combine to take up the 'slack' caused by the less than flat record, thereby supporting it better than the flat mat. I bet the original Rega Planet TT's three spokes supported the record far better than the later glass and felt arrangement.

Ah well but that's what clamps are for you might say, but that's just a bodge to sort out the problem created by a flat mat in the first place. But that's more money in the pockets of the accessory makers, so that's alright then, and there's nothing better to make you look like a discerning audiophile than the sight of a ruddy great clamp or die cast, mirror-polished weight, doing a glitterball impression in your listening room. Even better, what about a vacuum suck down platter that needs your records and the platter surface to be surgically clean if you don't want grit to be pressed into your precious vinyl. That'll be 120 grand to you sir, plus the clean room installation. What

All IMHO and YMMV depending on how daft you are

God I'm getting cynical
I blame the DIY hi-fi habit.

Nice Audio Technica VM540ML cartridge arrived this morning and is sounding lovely in the Mayware arm.
It is a solid, sure-footed performer and the end-of-side performance is exemplary.

The cartridge is better balanced than the AT440MLb due to the fact that it is less bright. As a result of this better balanced frequency response, we get a natural presentation that is detailed and dynamic without throwing a welter of leading edges at the listener. The AT440MLb is a great cartridge, don't get me wrong, but this less treble happy VM540ML is a worthwhile improvement.

In the Mayware arm/JBE turntable, it is a state of the art tracker and gets on with making music without fuss. Tracking force at 1.8 - 2.2g is higher than the AT440MLb. I'm using 1.8g. I'd recommend this cart if you are in the market for a good moving magnet jobbie.

got the jbe back the other day, and immediately started fiddling.
nothing major, just fitting of the at150 cart and a change to the legs.

Jbe series 3 transfi legs mayware f4 at150sa by anthony cresswell, on Flickr

the legs are off another build i did for a friend, they were far to tall for the plinth i did for that one and were stuck to the original plinth with some sort of uber glue which was much tougher than expected. i had to bash them off the old plinth with a heavy rubber mallet............. :banghead:
spot on for the jbe though

Jbe series 3, mayware formula 4, audio technica at150sa on new legs by anthony cresswell, on Flickr

back into service spinning abit of steely dan, forgot how good it is

The feet suit the looks...

Well it's not like the original micro seiki microsorber legs grow in trees, I've pretty much given up finding any replacements for sensible money.
Seemed a real shame to let these go to waste

Just managed to find some new silicone rubber discs to replace the old perished ones on the top of the platter pods, should make a nice little update

Turntable looks great, how much would something like this fetch these days?

Dunno really, somewhere around 400 quid depending on what arm and cart it has and what condition it's in. They originally came with a 3009 on them, ones with a 3009 still attached seem to go for more. There's a rare one on ebay at the moment with a bigger plinth than this one that was originally factory made for the dynavector dv505 arm