Across the Channel, Dual, Garrard's big Euro competitor, developed a floating counterweight that broke up the major resonance peak into several smaller ones-or at least that was the theory. I don't think Garrard ever introduced any sort of resonance damping for their arms. No contest, as far as accuracy and long terms speed stability was concerned. Garrard later went to a modified belt drive thing, as the Japanese were introducing quartz PLL. Technics stamped strobe dots directly into their platters. Strobe markings on the Garrard consisted of a paper template glued to the bottom of the platter. Very crude compared to what Panasonic developed for their speed control-electronic frequency generated variable speed, with one moving part-the motor itself. Garrard's speed control mechanism was an idler geared to a tapered shaft, connected via a mechanical knob. But you can see why Japanese decks took over the market. God knows what that cost them to develop and produce, at a price point. And I still think the pantograph arm does things better than any pivoted arm, at least as far as the effects of tracking error goes. I still use a Garrard Zero 100, which is almost 50 years old. The Cartridge Man makes a decoupling pad to fit between headshell and cartridge which gives apoplexy to the static thinking stiffer is always better majority but is probably a good idea, though it is too recent for me to have measured one. The more rigid the arm the higher the frequencies it will carry from the chassis to the headshell - if there are any. One could question whether a more rigid arm is better or worse for spurious vibration pickup. Making bits stiffer usually raises their resonant frequency (mass is the other parameter so just stiffer may not do it). The fact is that nothing is rigid over the whole audible frequency range. If, at resonance, the mode shape has a node between headshell and platter (likely at that sort of frequency) it can't possibly effect the cartridge output, for example. This displays a lack of understanding of vibration and resonance and how a seismic transducer (the cartridge) works. I have seen criticisms of springs for applying tracking force because they will resonate. This is quasi-static thinking and a wild over simplification. There is much talk of "rigid" arms and other bits being advantageous in "tracing the groove". The idea was to look at the various modes of vibration of the chassis arm and platter over the audible frequency range and make sure none had an anti-node between the headshell and platter - that is what the cartridge measures. We had the first scanning method of analysing the various modes I had ever seen. There was a plan from the chief engineer to compete with the more stylish new Japanese decks but the stylist guy wasn't an engineer and he put controls where he liked the look of them and styled the shape so something like a Pioneer PL12D which had a bent bit of piano wire sensibly positioned and held in place by 2 washers and self tapping screws the Garrard design had a rotary control at the front, leading to awful feel and high manufacturing costs. Garrards belonged to Plessey when I was there. It is certainly the case that clever engineering can make a very effective record player without it being very expensive though the current hifi fashion hasn't gone that way. There we were trying to use more advanced engineering methods to evaluate ways to make record players better whilst keeping them inexpensive to make. I wanted to move a bit nearer the motor racing teams so looked for another noise and vibration job and got one at Garrard. #TNT AUDIO GARRARD ZERO 100 SOFTWARE#I had met an engineer from one racing car constructor who had started using my software and I had been analysing other engineering stuff for them, part time. where I did a lot of measurements, including designing my own transducers. Whilst I was a student I managed to convince the University to let me do a 3rd year project to do with designing a racing car for myself, part of which ended up being a computer programme to optimise racing car suspension, which with the naivety of youth I didn't realise had never be done before.īy the time I left Uni to return to David Browns they had sold Aston Martin and I ended up as a junior engineer in the Noise and Vibration section of the R&D dept. My intention had been to get a job with Aston Martin since my ambition was to design racing cars. I graduated Imperial College with a degree in Mechanical Engineering in 1971 having done an apprenticeship with David Brown Ltd. It will add to it from time to time so this is just an introduction. Suggested I tell some stories about when I worked for Garrard so I have started this thread.
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