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Rotation speed issues: Rega Planar 3 2016

K

Kronius

New Member
Last June, I purchased a brand new 2016 Rega Planar 3 -- this was my very first turntable ever. At the same time I bought a KAB Speedstrobe. At the time of purchase, I measured the rotation speed at 33rpm with the speedstrobe. At that time the turntable was spinning about 0.2% fast. According to KAB, industry standard is anything below 0.3%, so I was very happy.

Since then I have done nothing but play records, pretty much daily. I haven't moved it and nothing has happened to it that could have damaged it in any way.

Recently I ran the Speedstrobe test again, but this time the turntable was spinning about 0.6-0.7% fast, so about double the standard margin of error.

I do not hear any difference in the sound quality, but I feel like I spent enough on this turntable that it should be within the industry standard margin of error.

Should I be concerned, or is this not a big deal?

Thanks!
 
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Get in touch with Rega. They should be able to tell you what's going on or if you need to do something about it .
 
I'm not familiar with the Speedstrobe but it seems like a well thought-out product. Still, it might be that the strobe itself is inaccurate. I would run an independent test to verify. Mark a dot on the platter and count 100 revolutions while you run a timer. Should come out to exactly 3 minutes.

Also, I believe the Planar 3 runs on AC, right? If so, your platter speed is directly coupled to the line frequency, which is not rock stable. Try your strobe at different times of the day.

If it does run too fast, that would mean the belt is riding on a larger diameter of the pulley than it should.
 
Agreed. I'm just saying it's easy to rule out with a stopwatch and a dot stuck on the platter.

Kronius, you are measuring while a record is playing, right? In theory, needle drag shouldn't affect an AC drive, but in practice, the belt does slip a small amount under load, and may ride in a slightly different position.
 
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