Site Map   Use the dropdown bar to navigate.

http://www.audiophile-uk.org.ukhttp://www.aidophile-uk.org.uk

 

Vinyl Logo

Restoration of a late 1970's Classic Turntable

 

   

 

The classic Pioneer PL-L1000 Tangential Tracking Turntable from the late 1970's.

 

 

On this page I'd like to introduce to you a rare beast.   The Pioneer PL-L1000 Linear Tracking turntable.   This particular deck is a late 1970's classic and it was one of the better decks available from Pioneer during this decade.  

I came to be the owner of this particular turntable upon a visit to the local ham radio club here in Hull.   It was originally destined for the skip!  Because I had showed a slight curiosity towards the item and I was duly awarded the job of restoring it.  Somehow, I don't think they knew the value of this item?

My particular deck was in reasonable condition but it was immediately obvious that it had led a hard life and it was duly starting to show some signs of neglect.   Indeed, it was in severe need of a good clean and both, the power and the signal cables were in need of replacement.   Being a bit of a dab hand with a soldering iron I set about the task of replacing cables.  This having been done it began to look something like.   

Once tidied up it was found that the cartridge and stylus were totally shot and had to be replaced.   The original Ortofon OM5e was duly replaced with an Audio-Technica AT110.   But having replaced it I found that the sound was very heavy on the bass and had little or no treble to speak of.  Kick up the arse due to me, it suddenly dawned on me that my cartridge on the Rega is a Moving-Coil and the phono stage is set to match.  A quick change to Moving-Magnet on the phono-stage to match the installed cartridge and all is well!   Now there's a lesson for numb-skulls!

For information purposes, the Pioneer PL-L1000 turntable was also sold in the United States under the Phase Linear name.  The Phase Linear version had a silver base and was known as a Phase Linear model 8000.  The later PL-L1000A had a carbon fibre arm and was sold in the U.S.A. under the Phase Linear model 8000A.

Most of the PL-L1000's that have shown up in the U.S.A. were brought back by servicemen stationed overseas.

You may be interested in visiting the Phase Linear web site at: http://hometown.aol.com/PhaseTek   Where you will find some information there about the PL-L1000 turntable.   The webmaster of this site, Dean was the only Phase Linear technician to visit Japan and receive first hand training on the repair of these turntables.

 

The Phase Linear version of this turntable.   Photo courtesy of the Phase Linear Website

 

 

The following comments are from the newsgroup rec.audio.hi-end  dated 9/10/11-02-01.    While I may not entirely agree with what has been said regarding this turntable, there is enough subjective information here to decide for yourself whether this turntable is real Audio Gem or just another Pup?


First of all, the table is direct-drive. While not in and of itself a bad concept, the Japanese mass-market implementation of it was just junk. On the other hand, the US$75,000 Rockport turntable uses direct-drive and it works superbly. I'm not saying that one needs to spend the price of a new Porsche or Maserati on a turntable for DD to work, but the Japanese DDs were terrible. The platters rang like bells, were too light to effectively smooth-out the cogging associated with the design and the motor bearings (which were also the turntable platter bearings) were simply not up to the task. The result was a table which had little bass, sounded grainy and bright, and with a good arm and cartridge would work a direct coupled solid-state amplifier at subsonic frequencies so hard as to make some of them overheat.

Now, to straight-line tracking. Since records are cut with a straight line tracking lathe, it would make sense to track the record the same way. Now, good SLT arms like the Souther (now part of the Clearaudio tables) or Bruce Thigpin's air-bearing designs work well, and are good arms. But the Japanese, again, used SLT as a marketing ploy. It turns out that the benefits of SLT are a tertiary effect and the difference between a well set-up pivoted arm and the best SLT is negligible in actual listening practice. Also, the Japanese SLTs used servo motors and limit switches to "crab" the arm across the record in a series of small arcs, so tracking error is not really eliminated because the stylus is really only tangent with the groove at one point in the center of each small arc. Admittedly, the maximum error is small, but its small in a properly set-up pivoted arm as well.

Now, I had a Phase Linear 8000 when it came out and was mighty proud of it too, I can tell you. But a buddy brought his new Linn Sondek LP-12 over one day (I laughed up my sleeve at this 'ancient technology'). We were both running Shure V-15's of the era (as per J. Gordon Holt), and I expected the PL-8000 to just walk all over the Linn. Boy was I wrong! The PL-8000 had NO bass compared to the Linn, and the cartridge sounded brittle and glassy in the Phase Linear while it was clean and lucid all the way to the top in the Linn. The Linn imaged beautifully, the Phase Linear, not at all. The PL-8000 was for sale the next day.

The next time I tried SLT was with the belt-drive Maplenoll Athena. This arm was one of Bruce Thigpin's air-bearing designs and it worked well. This was a good table, and it sounded great but because the platter also rode on an air-bearing, and both the arm and platter shared the same air-pump, it was difficult to keep the proportioning between the two adjusted correctly. Enough air to lift the heavy lead platter, and the arm bearing scrapped on its plenum. Proportion the air more to the arm, and the platter rubbed. Also the pump was noisy, and there was no remote switch. So one either had keep the entire table in another room from where one was listening, or walk into another room and switch the pump on for every listening session.  Another problem was that unless one had enough air hose (at least 50 ft) to smooth out the air flow, the 60 Hz air pump rate - the air came in 60 pulses a second, would cause the platter to vibrate at 60 Hz. This would, in turn, excite the stylus at 60 Hz in the vertical plane, and the speakers would hum badly. Just too much trouble.
-- 
George Graves




Let me second George's impressions of the Phase Linear 8000.  I too succumbed to the marketing hype, bought the table, used it about two weeks, and sold it. My Linn was next, and has served me faithfully for 20 years.

Looked beautiful, but functioned as crap.
--
Harry Lavo




I'm certainly glad that I wasn't the only one so duped, but OTOH, I'm sorry that you had to spend, what was then a great deal of money to learn the same lesson I did. The PL-8000 left such a sour taste for the concept in my mouth that I balked slightly when I found out that the hyper-expensive Rockport used the technology. It was like:" Well, OK, if you say so, but......"

I realize that all of the system's drawbacks can be overcome with the application of enough money, but then so can idler-wheel rim drives problem's too. It's just a case of the results being that much better than alternatives which can work well at almost every price point (like belt drive).

There was another Japanese DD table which could actually be made quite respectable if one was willing to put in the time and effort required (at least the 'fix' wasn't expensive). That was the Kenwood KD-500. At the time, an automotive dampening 'putty' called Mortite (available from most body-shop jobbers) could be judiciously applied to the underside of the platter to keep it from ringing. Then a heavy lead-impregnated rubber mat from a company called Ongaku (or a 'Platter Pad') replaced the useless thin rubber mat that accompanied the Kenwood. Last, but not least, Isolation feet such as the spring-loaded ones sold by Audio Technica (I think) completed the package. I helped a friend modify a Kenwood KD-500 in this manner and it was quite good (though not as good as any of the better belt drives from Sony, Linn, or Thorens at the time). Alas, the PL-8000's problems did not yield to a similar treatment.

--
George Graves

So there you go, it may not be quite what you wanted to hear but there are valid points and subjective as always.   If anybody has any more information on this deck please drop me a line.  

 

This pictures shows another linear tracking model - The Pl800 also from Pioneer.

 

KeVlaR

 

Please visit Christian McFarquhar's site.  

A great place for buying 45rpm seven inch vinyl records, books and accessories.