Rega Planar 3 - more tweaks and upgrades
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- Опубликовано: 24 мар 2023
- My continuing adventures in my quest for better audio!
In this episode I'm sorting out the dodgy bearing sleeve and building a new off-board motor mount.
The parts for the off-board motor mount came to less than £10 - that's for the disc, the stems, the screws, I have also added a sticky anti-slip mat for the base of the motor mount (it came after this video was recorded).
It's working really well. The motor will always be slightly noisy - might just need to change the resistor and the ripple capacitor - but this mod removes the noise from the turntable entirely. You can't usually hear the motor from the listening position.
Stay tuned for episode 3, coming whenever, at some point, maybe.
- radical departure, a lot more money, could be quite the system.
Im looking at my Rega 3 that i bought yesterday and it looks beautiful the glass platter is absolutely stunning no need to change anything but as long as your having fun.
Groovetracer is worth the money, they are of excellent quality. Maybe Tangospinner is good too, but a metal subplatter is the best tweak.
Type of mat is more of personal choice and to suit your taste. Felt is good, together with cork.
Very interesting.
I use a fidelity designs delrin subplater and platter on my modified RP6.
The most notable sound difference was when using an Origin Live cartridge enabler when I was using a 2M Red cartridge on one of my other Rega turntables, of which I have four.
Jim🏴🙂
I have looked at these, following your suggestion. I'm interested.
@@ashtontechhelp mats wise, of the ones I've tried that are the best for me are either; the Funk Firm Acromat (3mm) ruclips.net/user/shortsqf3VLU0ejxk?feature=share
or the Origin Live mat platter mat (1mm)
ruclips.net/video/t_DXKb4Zs5s/видео.html
Both bought cheap pre-owned 😉
Mats are a waste of money when you can put a delrin platter on the Rega which is exactly what I did to my RP6. It made the biggest difference. Everything got quieter and more stable. Groovetracer is the manufacturer.
@@bbophead1 the mats were/ are on my modified RP3, The delrin platter is on my modified RP6!
@@bbophead1 Delrin platters are a /lot/ of money. Perhaps they are extremely effective, but £20 for a cork mat, which resolves many issues, is a bargain.
I have a GrooveTracer sub platter and it works beautifully.
So you upgraded to a sub platter which looks nice but doesn't spin as well as the original Rega sub-platter. So how is that an upgrade?
Short answer: it isn't. I went back to the original. This series is all about my investigations into what works and what does not. That particular idea did not work.
I must have got a bit luckier with the second hand Iceni sub platter i got. I only lapped the end that sits on the ball to get rid of the machining marks down to a mirror finish. Spinning mine at about the same start speed as you did, it spins for what seemed like a couple of minutes (didnt time it though)
I have the exact same sub platter on my P3 and it's okay. What I did notice is you had the motor bolted directly to the plinth, there is a Sorbothane pad that fits between the two so no noise is transmitted.
The motor was previously fitted with a sorbothane pad. The problem there is that the motor is suffering vibrations - I think the capacitor and resistor are the wrong values for this particular motor. The metal screws will also transmit too much vibration up to the deck, hence the off-board motor mount. But I have a new motor ! - see next video, coming soon.
Groovetracer
Is the cork mat better than the original felt one.
I no longer have the original with which to compare - no idea what happened to it. But it seems likely, yes. Very much greater contact with the glass, very much denser, more "springy". I would like to try neoprene or silicone but not if it means shelling out a lot more money, to find little difference.
@@ashtontechhelpSRM Tech sell an "expanded neoprene material" mat called Arezzo Platter mat, it comes with a "Free £19.95" Platter Damper, I bought the 2mm thick Arezzo mat as the platter damper is 1mm thick. It's on their website at 27.95 pounds.
I have a video up showing it, one of my subscribers says in the comments he fitted ithe same to his P6 and loves it.
No
i have an rp3 and upgraded my sub platter and platter with items from fidelity designs.
not cheap. i went for the reference sub platter/bearing sleeve and 26mm acryllic platter.
it spins on and on and on with the slightest of effort.
like i said, not cheap, but good quality items imo.
Acrylic is less dense than glass - but will also ring less. I'm playing with the idea of sandwiching titanium sheet with magnesium or molybdenum can't recall which, possibly also cork / neoprene layers, but the two metals sandwiched together dull out sound very quickly. Don't hold your breath on that one though, it's a lot of money and I don't have a lathe. I also like the idea of an iron platter, with a groove cut around the edge and lead poured in, then smoothed off. Lead really dampens sound and would really enhance the flywheel effect. Again, don't hold your breath, i don't have a forge.
I too have Fidelity Designs ®️ Reference Subplatter and mine also spins freely.
3min 14sec to come to a standstill.
Your resin sub platter could use a clean …rubber tracks o the rim.
I would wager a goodly amount that in a blind listening test where the participants were not even told the format the music was been played on, let alone the brand of that playback equipment, they would be hard pushed to tell the difference between a Rega P1 and P10 if it was a analog format used
Dunno. There is quite a bit of difference between the materials used between those two price points. You would have to use the same cartridge, if you were to do such a test.
Having gone down this long journey to look for better audio, I can certainly say that I was not happy with the clarity I was getting and I now am. I'm really enjoying my music now.
I think that Rega are a little over-priced for what they are. If you bought the bearing sleeve, the sub-platter, a acrylic platter, the motor, the Azure kit, the arm, the cartridge, you would probably only be spending what they charge for the P3 - but have a much better sound.
Unless you enjoy tinkering , wouldn’t it have been better/easier to upgrade to P6 or P8 to get a better sound quality experience.
I do enjoy tinkering and this is a much cheaper route to high quality... If you buy the SRM Tech parts and then get hold of the bearing, subplatter, glass platter (or acrylic if you're feeling fancy), arm and motor, you're still only spending what a new planar 3 costs but at much higher quality.
Wall mount for the win…decoupled motor…see Cheshire Audio.
Completely agree. Not possible in my living room, sadly
@@ashtontechhelp Cheshire has an isolation platform that essentially mimics the SME suspension using o rings instead of springs.
You obviously like diy.
Build a suspended platform with the decoupled motor poking through the base and the suspended platform or fix it to the base and only poke through the suspended platform…the Rega plinth will take the place of something like the Oracle design’s sub chassis. If you want to make life easy put levelling feet on the base of the platform…3 feet are more stable and require only two of them to effect levelling. See Michael Lim for feet and more. The Rega bearings are plenty good enough stock. If you emulate the Oracle suspension you’ll be miles ahead of many of the RUclips stars mucking about trying to better Rega at their own approach. Imo You were paying for the bearing and motor with the Planars and you’re obviously adventuresome enough to create a suspension similar to the SME table and Oracle using MDF in place of metal and towers. If you wanted to you could laminate the mdf with arborite to maintain a Rega vibe…bad play on words intended.
Bon chance!
I regret wasting money on upgrading my p3...
i suppose i could have saved some money if I had gone straight to the SRM Azure platform (see third video in the series). It is very much better. But I had fun playing about, so that's okay.
@@ashtontechhelpI love the fin of tweeking too!
The good thing is at lrast if you sell the upgrades you'll get some of your money back.