The Cartridge Man makes a decoupling pad to fit between headshell and cartridge which gives apoplexy to the static thinking stiffer is always better majority but is probably a good idea, though it is too recent for me to have measured one. The more rigid the arm the higher the frequencies it will carry from the chassis to the headshell - if there are any. One could question whether a more rigid arm is better or worse for spurious vibration pickup. Making bits stiffer usually raises their resonant frequency (mass is the other parameter so just stiffer may not do it). The fact is that nothing is rigid over the whole audible frequency range. If, at resonance, the mode shape has a node between headshell and platter (likely at that sort of frequency) it can't possibly effect the cartridge output, for example.
This displays a lack of understanding of vibration and resonance and how a seismic transducer (the cartridge) works. I have seen criticisms of springs for applying tracking force because they will resonate. This is quasi-static thinking and a wild over simplification. There is much talk of "rigid" arms and other bits being advantageous in "tracing the groove". The idea was to look at the various modes of vibration of the chassis arm and platter over the audible frequency range and make sure none had an anti-node between the headshell and platter - that is what the cartridge measures. We had the first scanning method of analysing the various modes I had ever seen.
There was a plan from the chief engineer to compete with the more stylish new Japanese decks but the stylist guy wasn't an engineer and he put controls where he liked the look of them and styled the shape so something like a Pioneer PL12D which had a bent bit of piano wire sensibly positioned and held in place by 2 washers and self tapping screws the Garrard design had a rotary control at the front, leading to awful feel and high manufacturing costs. Garrards belonged to Plessey when I was there. It is certainly the case that clever engineering can make a very effective record player without it being very expensive though the current hifi fashion hasn't gone that way. There we were trying to use more advanced engineering methods to evaluate ways to make record players better whilst keeping them inexpensive to make. I wanted to move a bit nearer the motor racing teams so looked for another noise and vibration job and got one at Garrard.
Tnt audio garrard zero 100 software#
I had met an engineer from one racing car constructor who had started using my software and I had been analysing other engineering stuff for them, part time. where I did a lot of measurements, including designing my own transducers. Whilst I was a student I managed to convince the University to let me do a 3rd year project to do with designing a racing car for myself, part of which ended up being a computer programme to optimise racing car suspension, which with the naivety of youth I didn't realise had never be done before.īy the time I left Uni to return to David Browns they had sold Aston Martin and I ended up as a junior engineer in the Noise and Vibration section of the R&D dept. My intention had been to get a job with Aston Martin since my ambition was to design racing cars. I graduated Imperial College with a degree in Mechanical Engineering in 1971 having done an apprenticeship with David Brown Ltd. It will add to it from time to time so this is just an introduction. However, without trying to sound too harsh, if you're going to send out a product for review, it's important to check out its functioning before shipping and that would include making sure it's running at the right speed.Īs the importer points out, the Kid Thomas previously reviewed ran at the correct speed but clearly this one did not and it was what was sent so there was an obligation to review "as sent" just as there was an obligation to ship a properly functioning review sample! I know this might sound "harsh" but I'm always thinking of the consumer who buys and uses without checking speed accuracy and ends up listening at the wrong speed.ĪnalogPlanet readers' thoughts on this are most welcome.Suggested I tell some stories about when I worked for Garrard so I have started this thread.
The importer wrote to say the unit was sent with "the wrong pulley" and as stated in the review, we allowed for the possibility that the 'table had been previously used for reviews or for some other purpose. In this case the speed was "off" but the 'table was neither "broken" nor "defective" so we chose to review "as sent". Editor's note: AnalogPlanet (and Stereophile) policy is to review products as sent to us unless they are broken and/or clearly defective.