Splatter Pak
High-End Scrounger
Here's the story:
I picked up a Yamaha YP-B4 at a garage sale - it had good cosmetics, and the motor spun, so it looked like a good project. It even had a David Beatty sticker, and in the Kansas City area, that was always like an imprimatur. OK, so far I have put a platter mat on it from a Dual, added a metal headshell from somewhere, replaced the torn-up feet with nice squishy ones, put a new drive belt on it, and rebuilt the dry-rotted motor mounts with Sorbothane. It now sits on a massive slab of plex, which in turn, sits on seven Audioquest Sorbothane pucks, which sit on the top of my Sanus rack. Output goes to a Musical Fidelity X-10 V3, then on to the phono section of an Arcam Delta 60.
Back to the 'table. I have installed an Aurex 550M cartridge, one not heard about often, and not a typical AT unit. I would love to know who made it, for it sounds great. I have in hand a set of silver litz headshell wires which I am going to install, and at the same time I will put a bit of Bluetack on the bottom of the headshell, as I hear that is good for vibration and resonance control. A bit of glue will keep the stylus assembly in sync to the cartridge body - I do know about that trick.
What else can I do to make this thing sound better? I have some Sorbothane tube dampers which I can cut and wrap around the tonearm. I am also wondering what I can do to keep down ringing in the metal platter. Any ideas? How about changes in the chassis, such as replacing the fiberboard bottom plate? I could just drop the whole thing down on the plex. How about adding mass or removing all the stamped steel auto start/return parts? I use it like an manual TT anyway.
I picked up a Yamaha YP-B4 at a garage sale - it had good cosmetics, and the motor spun, so it looked like a good project. It even had a David Beatty sticker, and in the Kansas City area, that was always like an imprimatur. OK, so far I have put a platter mat on it from a Dual, added a metal headshell from somewhere, replaced the torn-up feet with nice squishy ones, put a new drive belt on it, and rebuilt the dry-rotted motor mounts with Sorbothane. It now sits on a massive slab of plex, which in turn, sits on seven Audioquest Sorbothane pucks, which sit on the top of my Sanus rack. Output goes to a Musical Fidelity X-10 V3, then on to the phono section of an Arcam Delta 60.
Back to the 'table. I have installed an Aurex 550M cartridge, one not heard about often, and not a typical AT unit. I would love to know who made it, for it sounds great. I have in hand a set of silver litz headshell wires which I am going to install, and at the same time I will put a bit of Bluetack on the bottom of the headshell, as I hear that is good for vibration and resonance control. A bit of glue will keep the stylus assembly in sync to the cartridge body - I do know about that trick.
What else can I do to make this thing sound better? I have some Sorbothane tube dampers which I can cut and wrap around the tonearm. I am also wondering what I can do to keep down ringing in the metal platter. Any ideas? How about changes in the chassis, such as replacing the fiberboard bottom plate? I could just drop the whole thing down on the plex. How about adding mass or removing all the stamped steel auto start/return parts? I use it like an manual TT anyway.
