Tag: Japanese Turntables

Back at my friend Makesh’s place, who since my last article was seen suitably content with what the Akai(Night Watchman) was doing, but as is usually with life, there was a proverbial spanner thrown in the works. The Akai developed speed issues and was sent to a gent who was supposed to be an old hand with rectifying vintage turntables among other equipment. Days become weeks, to months, but no sign of anything productive happening which makes Makesh quite frustrated and forces him to get the Akai back from the old hand. In the meantime, the old hand had done more damage than good and now the Akai is deemed to its morbid fate. Makesh is back to square ONE again! With no sight of the Lenco L75 coming to life in the near future, he decides to call for a replacement to the erstwhile night watchman, yet again in the form of another old warhorse, I mean watchman, I mean turntable. This time, he lands himself with a Trio 4100, yet again with a darkened dust cover(maybe he has a fetish for them?)Anyway, the said turntable arrives from God’s own country and that too in a state of disrepair! I was summoned to ‘help’ set up the turntable but only when I reached, did I realise the obvious had taken place. Since the intent to diagnose the issue was omnipresent, we started investigating with what might have caused the issues to be created in the first place. We start with the disassembly and identify what was one  probable issue almost immediately. The said Trio model was an automatic, which had been converted to a manual by the ‘expert’ back in God’s own country. The said automatic portion of the tonearm was fouling with the tonearm movement thereby rendering it incapacitated.  On taking pics of the same and forwarding them to the seller, he advises Makesh to open the underside cover of the turntable and set aside the fouling piece. We are now ready for ‘Surgery’ to do the needful and ensure that the offending piece is put into its moribund resting position, post which check the movement of the tonearm, which thankfully now is moving freely thanks to removal of the impeding piece. We put the undercover back and cross fingers prior to connecting the turntable to the rest of the setup. It turns ON, Hurray!!! But does it turn OFF??? Nope! Another call is made to relay this bit of information to the seller who says, it has a ’30 second’ delay system post which the turntable will switch off. 30 seconds turn to 3 minutes, but no sign of it turning off. Yet another call to the seller, who now says that we might have disturbed some wire when we opened the table for ‘surgery’. Fair point, but now that the turntable is operational, I insist we atleast spin some records to see if there are any other issues with respect to playback. Makesh brings out a ‘sacrificial lamb’ record, we play it and all seems fine for it to instill confidence into Makesh to play some better records from his collection. So, we are back in the running with the replacement night watchman, who has already had a very shaky start into his innings. Time will tell how long he stays at the wicket and what further adventures we shall participate in with him. Makesh is in that bittersweet position again and I know that the story ain’t ending here so shall continue writing about the saga, at a later date. Stay Tuned!