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Marks on the turntable mat

M

mamamato

New Member
Hi! The rubber mat on my turntable's platter has marks like the ones shown in the picture. I tried washing it with warm water and soap, but nothing happened. If anything, it looks a little faded now.

Does anyone know what might be causing these marks, and is there anything that can be done about them? It also might be worth mentioning that the mat smells a little, but I guess that's typical with vintage TT mats?1000009058.jpg
 
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guessing its the mat itself starting to break down. With age a lot of plastics and rubbers will start to fail and leech various chemicals out, usually stuff that keeps it flexible. Not a lot to be done for that once it starts unfortunately, but so long as its not oily or sticky I wouldn't get too worried about it. If it does start to ooze, a different mat is generally the fix. Based on the slots I'm guessing yours uses some sort of light-based size sensor so hat makes it more difficult. Any replacement mat would need those slots cut in to keep that system working.
 
The marks are probably from previous exposure to chemicals.
If your mat is not sweating oils or getting hard it is probably all right.
My treatment for turntable mats, and any other rubber, is Swipol rubber treatment. Lacrosse has a similar product. Spray on, rub in, let soak for hours, and wipe off with a clean cloth.
For rubber suspension grommets I let them soak in the rubber conditioner for days/weeks. With these you have no residue issues in relation to set off to the records.
 
gadget73 said:
guessing its the mat itself starting to break down. With age a lot of plastics and rubbers will start to fail and leech various chemicals out, usually stuff that keeps it flexible. Not a lot to be done for that once it starts unfortunately, but so long as its not oily or sticky I wouldn't get too worried about it. If it does start to ooze, a different mat is generally the fix. Based on the slots I'm guessing yours uses some sort of light-based size sensor so hat makes it more difficult. Any replacement mat would need those slots cut in to keep that system working.
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It's from Denon's fully automatic turntable. Since it can be arranged in two ways (with the holes visible and with them covered) I understand that it would be interchangeable. This eliminates the ability to automatically recognize 7-inch records, but then again, I don't own any of them anyway.

I've heard good things about Herbie's turntable mat, so maybe I will buy one. A new mat would look better, too.
 
I think that Denon found a material that was very “dead”, great material for TT mats but seems to bread down and really stink after 30 years.
 
mamamato said:
I do believe so. It really does smell every time I open the dust cover, but it's not so bad that I can't stand it.
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You can try washing it with dish soap and letting it air out. Should help wit the smell for a bit.

Some mats definitely haven't aged well. I've seen puddles under a few.
 
loudnoises said:
You can try washing it with dish soap and letting it air out. Should help wit the smell for a bit.

Some mats definitely haven't aged well. I've seen puddles under a few.
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I tried several types of cleaning and treatment with mine including leaving it out in open air for days, no change.

The smell wasn’t that bad in my opinion, a guy who grew up working in the garage, soldering things, … but my wife is not so tolerant of smells not floral.
 
SaturationPt said:
I tried several types of cleaning and treatment with mine including leaving it out in open air for days, no change.

The smell wasn’t that bad in my opinion, a guy who grew up working in the garage, soldering things, … but my wife is not so tolerant of smells not floral.
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Ahhh yes, the minor benefits of smoking for years i can become noseblind very easily to chemicals.

The technics mats seem to have survived the best, and there are a few different thicknesses. I've a stack of them i swap around as needed. The yamahas are heavier, thicker, and denser, but some of them leak oil. No smell i can detect.
 
When replacing mats on the Denon, I looked for similar weight and damping mats to the original as this was all part of the original design and spec. Of a TT. Something of a mid-durometer silicone or possibly Sorbethene seemed the closest.
 
bad smells are definitely a pointer towards material failure.

I have a Herbie's mat on my Thorens, it made a nice upgrade. One extra cool thing, you can order them with custom diameters and different thicknesses if needed. I don't know if they will do cutouts but its worth an ask.
 
gadget73 said:
bad smells are definitely a pointer towards material failure.
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I've put more thought into this than I should have...

With rubber and plastics it's almost more about environmental conditions. Heat cycling is a hugely detrimental factor, as well as peak temperature. You'll also get secondary reactions when other materials break down in the same closed environment that are totally outside the expected.

And you do get the unexpected long term (arguably failure), like with early pc cases yellowing due to bromine being used at some stage in the manufacturing then leeching out.

Yay material sciences!
 
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