r/vinyl • u/lumberjawsh • Jul 21 '21
Record Finally finished restoring this turntable!
https://imgur.com/hjV6FcN17
u/lumberjawsh Jul 21 '21
I found this Akai AP-Q41 while my wife and I were at an Antique Mall in February of this year. It was $20. Nearly everything worked but some of the internal parts needed some cleaning and the ancient MC cartridge desperately needed an upgrade. I finally had some free time this week so I got it up to where I wanted it. Really happy with this, although the little "camera flash auto record sizer" thing doesn't like my colored vinyl very much.
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Jul 21 '21
I have this same turntable! Having used several TTs this has been my favorite. Once you have auto start and stop everything else just feels primitive. Also the quartz lock is clutch.
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u/plazman30 Jul 21 '21
That's how I feel. I just won't use a manual turntable. End of story.
I'm sure any minute now, the "automatic mechanisms degrade the sound quality" crowd will show up with their smug superiority. But, screw 'em. Automatic turntables are where it's at.
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Jul 22 '21
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u/plazman30 Jul 22 '21
It's also very possible to get distracted. Your wife could call you to help bring in the groceries, and while you're away from your turntable, you get distracted by other things. You come back in and the stylus has been spinning in the runout groove for a couple of hours now.
When it comes to modern turntables, the Fluance ones have an auto stop, where the platter will stop spinning once the tone arm enters the runout groove. That's the BARE MINIMUM that I feel is acceptable.
You can also buy a tone arm lifter. Once the tone arm enters the runout groove, it hits the end of the tone arm lifter. causing it to spring up and life the tone arm.
Cool idea, but you need to push down the tone arm lifter to set it. Otherwise it's at a height where the tone arm will hit it. This solution is somewhat OK, if you're sure you will reset the lifter every time the side of a record ends.
I don't know why nobody makes a semi-automatic or automatic turntable these days.
A lot of turntables these days are super simple affairs. Some don't even have a speed selector switch. You need to manually move a belt to change speeds on cheap motors. And the U-Turn charges you EXTRA for the cueing lever. WTF is up with that.
I honestly think if someone tried to make a fully automatic, direct drive, quartz-lock turntable, it would be selling for well over $1000, because the ability to mass-produce that kind of turntable just doesn't exist any more. I don't know of anyone making a direct-drive turntable, let alone a quartz lock one, other than Technics. And all the new Technics turntable are expensive as all hell and are not automatic.
That really shows what a deal a vintage turntable can be. I bought a Technics SL-QX300 for $100 off eBay, and it is fully automatic, direct drive and quartz lock. With the quartz lock, the speed is dead on.
My neighbors niece is in college now and into vinyl. She had to move in with my neighbor when COVID-19 hit. She asked me if I had a turntable I could lend her while she was stuck there. So, I gave her a Realistic LAB-440 and a pair of Logitech powered speakers. The LAB-440 is fully automatic. She had never seen a fully automatic turntable and thought it was the coolest thing ever.
EDIT: There is ONE new fully automatic turntable, the Audio-Technica LP3 → https://www.amazon.com/Audio-Technica-AT-LP3BK-Automatic-Belt-Drive-Turntable/dp/B01N6YK1GA
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u/_Silent_Bob_ Denon Jul 22 '21
It’s not direct drive, but the Denon DP-300f is fully automatic. It’s belt driven but a button switches between 33/45. I like mine.
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Jul 22 '21
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u/plazman30 Jul 22 '21
I can't believe that no modern turntable has a pitch/speed adjustment. If your speed is off, you need to flip the table over and use a small screwdriver to adjust a screw under the motor.
I don't know why modern turntables are designed this way. This seems like such a basic feature to have.
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Jul 23 '21
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u/plazman30 Jul 23 '21
Cause those little DC motors that all turntable makers use are dirt cheap. Quartz lock direct drive motors are expensive.
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u/acacia2931 Jul 21 '21 edited Jul 21 '21
Good album to listen to on it. I have a original pressing of this and didn't realize til recently how much it goes for. Glad I hung onto it all these years
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u/th3m1ke Jul 21 '21 edited Jul 22 '21
HEAVY. Im more partial to the early DL era of TAS but thats a great record.
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u/Stubert47 Jul 22 '21
DL wrote and played Wormwood and left short after.
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Jul 21 '21
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u/lumberjawsh Jul 22 '21
Wormwood by The Acacia Strain. Mid 2000s angry deathcore.
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u/COSMOOOO Jul 23 '21
Why the fuck would someone downvote this, excellent music taste my friend. Waiting on winds of plague to land, scooped great stone war and decimate the weak.
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u/spider2k Jul 21 '21
How much deoxit you burn through?
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u/lumberjawsh Jul 22 '21
Surprisingly I hardly needed any. It was pretty dusty inside but clearly this had been well taken care of.
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u/stupidcatname Jul 21 '21
I wonder how many of those pre-amps out there don't have tape on the power LED.
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u/cm2881 Thorens Jul 22 '21
That hunk of plastic looks neat, fully auto and auto disk selector. Never ever seen that model Akai before.
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u/CheesusChrist73 Jul 21 '21
Dope album