AR EB101 turntable
 

I was asked to look at this turntable because the belt kept slipping off and sometimes the motor went backwards.

I obtained a new belt which was 186mm diameter, 4mm wide, but there isn't enough torque for the motor to start it.

I've also replaced the 0.82uF capacitor with an X2 275V replacement.

I presume the motor has failed. Can it be repaired, if so how, if not what is a suitable replacement?

Re: AR EB101 turntable
 

There are suppliers of small motors and also spares for more common turntables.

Shaft diameter for the belt crown/pulley is one parameter. Synchronous RPM can be got from measuring pulley diameters and going for the nearest integer number of poles.

My boss recently got a new motor for his Dunlop turntable... Farnell and RS are a good starting point.

AR certainly didn't have special motors made for them, they'll have used standard parts in standard case size.

If you get one with the wrong revs, you could always make an inverter. Very fashionable in turntable circles :-)

David

Re: AR EB101 turntable
 

Thanks David,

Unfortunately the owner won't spend the money, so I've returned it to him.

Pity, these are nice turntables.

Re: AR EB101 turntable
 

It's a turntable with a bit of an audiophile following. The grandfather of the Ariston and the Linn.

Oh, well. You tried, Michael.

David

Re: AR EB101 turntable
 

I got caught out with a turntable recently. I was asked to check it over and found that the motor would not run up on applying power. There was not much to go wrong, a capacitor and the synchronous motor itself.

I changed the capacitor - no different so I set about searching on the net for a suitable replacement motor. Luckily, this searching revealed that this particular turntable was not meant to start on its own. You had to spin the turntable so that the motor could take over and then run as normal!

I can’t remember the brand now, I will have to look at my notes later but you live and learn!

SimonT.

Re: AR EB101 turntable
 

Likely to be a Connoisseur turntable made by Arnold Sugden in Brighouse.

The on/off knob had a little rubber nubbin sticking out of it to give the turntable a tweak in the right direction as it was rotated to the on position.

David

Re: AR EB101 turntable
 

The Sugden BD2 motor had a clutch to prevent reverse rotation, as did some clock motors
and I thought the off/on knob was a brake.

I am not too impressed with the Pro-Ject Essential II here, it would help if the platter had
a groove to encourage the belt to not slip off.

Re: AR EB101 turntable
 

The Nottingham Analogue turntable motors are designed to only just have enough strength to turn the platters, which are heavy, and you have to push start them. It’s not a method I would advocate, personally, but some people seem to like them.

The Connisseur motors should have enough welly to start the platter. They’re wobbly, noisy, vibratory, rarely turn in the right direction and are just generally appalling things, but they do generally have sufficient strength!

Re: AR EB101 turntable
 

..... It was indeed a Nottingham turntable! Thanks for jogging my memory!


SimonT.

Re: AR EB101 turntable
 

Rubbish. The BD1 was an excellent example of economy and fitness for purpose. At the time I got interested, I was able to assemble an excellent player for the princely sum of £25 - BD1, Lenco 75 arm, Goldring 800 cartridge. Allowing for a DIY ply plinth, that was real hi fi for what most people gave for an SP25. Now that really was appalling...

Re: AR EB101 turntable
 

I'm sure the off-topic police will be along to close us down in a minute but before they do, we're going to have to agree to disagree on this one!

I still rate the Connoisseur BD1/2 as one of the worst turntables ever made. The sticky bearing, flimsy top plate, poor quality motor and the utter joke of a motor mounting mean I find the whole thing, frankly, laughable. Also, people like to talk about the small bracket and the rubber pip on the on/off switch that make sure it runs in the right direction and what a clever idea they are. Why should it need these? All other turntable manufacturers managed to make their motors run in the right direction!

On this particular subject, I've owned three BD1s and a couple of Strathearn turntables - the latter I'm sure you're aware are regularly criticised for running backwards. None of my Strathearns ran backwards, even when I tried to force them to; the second BD1 had a broken 'correction bracket' and actually spent more time running backwards than forwards, yet this is supposedly viewed as an an amusing quirk on these models - why?!

Your compasrison with the Garrard SP25 is interesting as, to me, this was designed by a proper engineering company with more comprehensive R&D facilities than many people realise and actually has many clever facets to its design. Obviously, it was built to a price so is never going to be a world-beater but I'd happily take one over a BD1 any day - the design of which, let's face it, was thrown together by an (admittedly, quite ingenious) bloke in a shed.

Re: AR EB101 turntable
 

Hopefully such misconceptions will endure and grow which will mean that spare parts for my Connoisseur BD1 based turntable will continue to be available at bargain basement prices. After all, no self-respecting audiophile would touch such a thing. Fortunately Arnold Sugden was a designer and engineer who really understood the important fundamentals of vinyl reproduction. :)

Alan

Re: AR EB101 turntable
 

AR patented the suspended subchassis turntable in the late 1950s but the EB101 was introduced in 1984.

Re: AR EB101 turntable
 

And you are seriously bracketing the BD1 and the Strathearn? Oh, puleeease...

I owned and enjoyed a BD1 when they were current. It did not disgrace an SME arm, and served me very well until I moved on to a TD150. I repeat, it was an object lesson in economy and fitness for purpose - in other words, putting first things first. See Frank Jones' review in Hi Fi News to gauge the enthusiasm with which it was received at the time.

I will concede that the SP25 at least delivered a consistently mediocre performance, until it broke. I spent many an unhappy Saturday fixing up the 25s in the record shop where I worked.

Re: AR EB101 turntable
 

Granted, but the later machines were in all essentials of the original XA and XB pattern from the early 1960s, which, with their low price and ingenious features were as original and fit for purpose as, oh, the BD1, dare I say?

Re: AR EB101 turntable
 

I have heard this said before and he certainly came up with some innovative ideas for stereo. However, if he really was such a talented vinyl designer, you would think he would have known that two of its fundamentals are rotating the record at a consistent speed and in the right direction...

In all fairness, I have heard from an industry source that, by the time the BD1 design appeared, he was no longer involved with the product design and hadn't been for a few years, so maybe the Connoisseur Works' apprentice is to blame.

What's the problem? The two salient facts are that:

(1) Strathearns have a reputation for going round backwards

(2) The BD1/2 has two engineering 'sticking plasters' applied to it otherwise it has a tendency to do the same.

I just find it puzzling that (1) makes the Strathearn models a figure of fun, whereas (2) is a sweet and amusing little quirk that we should all go "Aaaaah; how cute" to. Surely they are either both a bad thing, or an irrelevance?

Re: AR EB101 turntable
 

The point is that he BD1 was fit for purpose and the Strathearn was not. For the record, my BD1 didn't go backwards on any occasion I remember.

Strathearn, although noble in intent, was a farce from the start, like its stablemate, DeLorean. The design was fatally flawed, the materials were wrong, the workforce were inadequately trained and the marketing was inept. A government operation, of course...at least DeLorean retained an expert consultant, but even Chapman couldn't make a proper product out of it. Stratearn Audio, and I know this from conversations with a former shop-floor employee, was the inept led by the ignorant. Connoisseur were neither. Granted, they over-reached badly with the BD3, but that is irrelevant to the present discussion.

Re: AR EB101 turntable
 

Trust me, you'll hear no argument from me about Strathearn in general. I'm certainly not defending their products, although I personally don't think they are quite as bad as sometimes made out.

However, here...

...I think you missed out the word "barely".

Re: AR EB101 turntable
 

Quite right Ted