Well after a week of working on this, I’ve discovered a few things.
Incorrect arm set down and return fault, which after much digging I discovered was related to a spring / clamp attached to the tone arm assembly, which had clearly been ******** about with, causing excessive slop in tone arm movement. I have bodged about with it and got it behaving now, I’d love to replace it ideally, but I’m suspecting I won’t find one of those anywhere. (Pic attached)
Looking for slow downs during auto trip, and dismantling the mech several times and pulling my hair out, I again revisited the idler and realised only 2/3 or 3/4 of it were contacting the motor pulley!! Strobe discs also verified poor speed in manual mode. Sometimes it really is the simple things you miss! The motor grommets don’t look too bad, I’ve seen worse, so for now I will jack the motor up with some washers
