Linear tracking turntables from the late 70's to mid 80's any of them sound good

I started to remembering them after another person posted on another thread. I still have a Harmon with a rabos arm, but it was not all that great. Were any of the mass market linear tables any good? Some had a tonearm, and others had mounting system in the lid (kinda like a close and play lol).
Most used p-mount cartridges, which some were ok. My Harmon took regular cartridges. I understand most used a servo motor to move the arm across the record. I even remember some that stood up vertically.
So anyone have one and use it? Anyone had one and would like to share their opinions?

 

Top 4 tangential TTs :

MITSUBISHI LT-V5


REVOX B795 :



TECHNICS SL-10 :



YAMAHA PX-3 :

 

I have a B&O 4002 and a Technics SL10.
The B&O design is a bit clunky and noisy with stylus replacement starting at over $200.
The Technics is better designed, quieter and built like a tank. It came with a quality LOMC P-Mount cart, even has a built in SUT!!! Sadly current manufacturers don't support the P'-Mount design with anything nearing the quality this table deserves...IMO.
But Technics offers other designs as well, and one of their tables would be my recommendation to you.
Also Pioneer I hear has some nice ones as well, however I would concern myself with condition on those.

 

I have two 80s servo driven P-Mount tables. I'm a fan. I don't think in general most linear trackers are very "hifi" by this forum's standards (with some exceptions); mine are certainly mid-fi pieces, but I love them both.

Technics SL-J33 (Direct Drive servo-driven tonearm-in-the-lid design) that I picked up in perfect working order needing a stylus at a Thrift shop yesterday for $14.50. I'm thrilled it works perfectly and I had a Frankenstein cart/stylus combo to put in it.


Sony PS-LX520 (Direct Drive servo driven tonearm in the plinth design) that I picked up at the same thrift some time last year, for $18.50. The Sony had a seized tonearm and needed fairly major reconstruction efforts but works perfectly and sounds fantastic.

 

Good, yes. Not as good as cheaper conventional tables, though.

There's a sound quality price to be paid for having a cool looking table.

 

The RABCO mounted on a THORENS 125 was the best money could buy in the '70s:

 

I have not heard the tables that Waxfreak mentions but I recently picked up Sony PS-X800 Biotracer and it is a well built and very nice sounding table. I put a AT 33EV cart that I bought from a member here and it definitely holds its own compared to my Empire 208 with a Denon 103r on it.

 

I think you will find a lot of love for the Technics SL-7 on this board.

 

I had an SL10 and it was pretty nice, but didn't sound as good as my Thorens so I gave it to my sister.

 

Yup. Got one and love it. So easy to use and great performance

 

Here's mine, a B&O Beogram 8002 with a MMC-1 cartridge on it. Sold between 1983 and 1986. It sounds great and plays very well.

Sure, my VPI Classic 2 with the 3D printed tone arm and a Lyra Kleos SL cartridge outperforms it but the B&O looks sexier, rejects all footfalls, and starts or stops at the press of a button. It also is about a tenth the price of the VPI combo. In any case, the B&O gets played more.

 

Beautiful industrial design on that era B&O stuff including that beauty. Nice!

 

Agreed completely.

It is not just a pretty face, though. It's phenomenal engineering. The turntable spins throgh a linear induction motor drive. It's cogless, as opposed to a direct drive platter, being constantly driven through the platter's revolution. And yet it's incredibly simple and reliable. It's the same kind of motor that turns your electrical meter. Those never fail.

B&O also figured out how to do the linear tracking right and I believe all the Japanese turntables of the era copied their design. A light on the tone arm shines onto a light sensor. As the needle plays the record it moves inward and the arm skews slightly. The amount of light the sensor picks up changes. That causes the turntable to turn a motor which moves the back of the tone arm inward. Once each revolution of the LP, the base of the tone arm moves further in toward the center of the turntable. Again, simple, although on my turntable the computing power to do it takes multiple printed circuit boards and is almost all discreet components. Only later did it get reduced to the size of a microprocessor. This definitely is early 1980s technology.

I started selling stereos in Ft. Collins, Colorado, with a large HP facility nearby in Loveland, and then went to Rochester, Minnesota, where there was an IBM plant which built mainframe computers. In both stores I had electrical and mechanical engineers buy B&O tangential arm turntables just because of the way they worked.

I'll show you the drive motor. First you take the platter off. That reveals the rotor of the motor, a black piece of iron covered in a plastic dampening compound to keep it from ringing,





The rim of the rotor sits between two offset electromagnets. They force the rotor to spin away from them. Speed is controlled by what looks like a tape head which reads little spokes on a disc beneath the platter. I know Denon copied this for their direct drive turntables.







Pretty cool, huh?

 

Super cool, although you have to admit the Technics - "put the motor magnets in the platter itself - the platter is part of the motor" concept is pretty awesome as well.

I think virtually all quartz lock DD turntables used something like that "tape head" sensor thingy. I think the ABS brakes in your car use something like that also.

 

Rabco arms sounded great when they worked right. I always had trouble getting the arm to move in. The back of the arm sat on a constantly spinning roller. As the needle tracked in and the arm got of out tangency, the roller caused the base of the arm to move inward. What you wanted to do was to have the arm in constant motion, always moving inward with the needle. Getting the arm tweaked just right to do that was an issue, at least for me.

I loved the Yamaha turntables of the era. They were very cool, as was the Pioneer. I agree with @PhilBiker, @Hershiser and @Slick Willie that the Technics were wonders. Their drives were outstanding, as were the arms. When you put a quality P-mount cartridge on them, you could get remarkable sound.

 

Yep super cool, need to take some pics of my 4002.
Still, their design is noisier than the Technics IMO. They (Technics) took the design to another level.

 

I posted this in another linear tracking thread around here, but a few years ago I walked into a record store in Boone, NC that also sells vintage equipment. They had a mint, freshly serviced SL-10 with a low-mileage 310MC cartridge, all accessories (minus the 45 light block sheet), original box and manual, and the original outer shipping box, all for $250. It's now my every-day player, and my main needle-drop source.

Lee

 

There are multiple generations between your 4002 and my 8002 (4002 > 4004 > 8000 > 8002). B&O continued to re-engineer the turntable. I once restored a TX, the next generation. While the two tone arms were almost identical, the electronics inside the TX was a third of that in my 8002.

I think very highly of your Technics. I'm not surprised it's better than a 4002. The 4002 was the second generation of B&O's tangential arm turntables, with only the 4000 coming before it. A more interesting comparison would be a TX or even a TX-2, which used a much simpler arm design, with the Technics. Those turntables were all from the same era.

 

I agree. Had one of those HK's with the Rabco arm. It was an epic pain in the ass.

 

I have a Pioneer PL-L800 that I'm very satisfied with. Servo controlled tonearm with a standard mount headshell. Using an AT440MLa with great results.

 

The very 1st piece of 'high-end' equipment I ever bought was a 2nd hand Revox 791 in the mid 80's. When I told the old-timer I was buying it from the other gear I owned at the time (Pioneer separates & Ohm Walsh 2's), he looked down his nose at me and said; "This is too much turntable for your system". Of course I felt he was mistaken, the deck sounded great, but ultimately, he was right! Once I started fussin' with changing the cart I never was able to tame her again, talk about finicky! So in my youthful enthusiasm what did I do? I traded her in for a Mapleknoll Ariadne, one of the most notoriously finicky turntables of all time! Tellyawhat though, besides the learning experience (felt like I made my audio 'bones' with this deck!, that Mapleknoll was the finest sounding turntable I ever owned, but what a beast to set up and maintain!

 

Ya mine weaved back and forth, made me wonder if was playing more nontangental than tangential.

 

Or just decide to stop tracking altogether. A general pain.

 

Agree 100%. I have a ST-7. I could never get the damn arm to work without it floating back and forth. I put it in a box around 1980 and it's still there.