JRF Posted March 3, 2018 Share Posted March 3, 2018 Hi, Bit of a long story so I'll try not to ramble ;). I'm looking for ideas on how I can improve my TT setup. For the last 20 years or so I've used a Planar 3 - it's the model with the RB300 and tungsten counterweight so it's fairly old. I've tried a couple of different cartridges but I've never warmed to it's sound, it's always been a bit clinical/ cold for my liking. I recently shipped another TT I've had in storage overseas which I always liked the sound of, it's an AR Legend (also known as The Turntable) which is a 3 point floating suspension design, however the arm isn't that great and the cartridge is EOL. So my current plans are to take the arm off the P3 and transplant to the AR, it'll need a new arm board but I can make that easily enough. Then sell the base of the P3 and use that money to fund an arm rewire on the RB300. I can then upgrade the AR as the will take me, new springs etc are all available. My question is, am I missing a trick here, are there better upgrade options without spending serious money? I'm open to any ideas, leftfield ain't a problem! Cheers Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
r3x Posted March 3, 2018 Share Posted March 3, 2018 I've had exactly that, and old RB300 on an AR. It was great! Yes rewire first, clean out the bearing and make sure all is good there. Make sure the motor is OK (the hurst motors are kinda crap, lots of room for upgrades there). Cheers, Rex 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ugly Posted March 3, 2018 Share Posted March 3, 2018 Hi, Bit of a long story so I'll try not to ramble . I'm looking for ideas on how I can improve my TT setup. For the last 20 years or so I've used a Planar 3 - it's the model with the RB300 and tungsten counterweight so it's fairly old. I've tried a couple of different cartridges but I've never warmed to it's sound, it's always been a bit clinical/ cold for my liking. I recently shipped another TT I've had in storage overseas which I always liked the sound of, it's an AR Legend (also known as The Turntable) which is a 3 point floating suspension design, however the arm isn't that great and the cartridge is EOL. So my current plans are to take the arm off the P3 and transplant to the AR, it'll need a new arm board but I can make that easily enough. Then sell the base of the P3 and use that money to fund an arm rewire on the RB300. I can then upgrade the AR as the will take me, new springs etc are all available. My question is, am I missing a trick here, are there better upgrade options without spending serious money? I'm open to any ideas, leftfield ain't a problem! Cheers Haha, I was reading your post and thinking this is sounding very familiar! I can't help you but welcome to the forum Julian.RegardsSteve Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andrews_melb Posted March 3, 2018 Share Posted March 3, 2018 Could an upgraded phono stage help? Only thinking that so you end up with a full TT to sell, which would be easier than selling a rega deck without tonearm. Id only guess but an old rega deck wouldnt go for too much. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mloutfie Posted March 3, 2018 Share Posted March 3, 2018 (edited) Selling an old rega deck especially if it's not 24v motor won't give you much. Try to put the old ar tonearm in the rega you might have better luck selling it. Putting rb300 on the ar I reckon good idea Edited March 3, 2018 by mloutfie Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JRF Posted March 3, 2018 Author Share Posted March 3, 2018 Hi, Thanks for the feedback and the welcomes - especially from my Brother-in-law 'Ugly' ! Thought I might bump into you here Steve. 6 hours ago, r3x said: I've had exactly that, and old RB300 on an AR. It was great! Yes rewire first, clean out the bearing and make sure all is good there. Make sure the motor is OK (the hurst motors are kinda crap, lots of room for upgrades there). Cheers, Rex Surprisingly the motor appears fine and is the original, I did replace the Rega motor a number of years ago with the upgrade model but it's not the new 24v version. Any particular motor you'd recommend, I've not dug into this area yet? Any other upgrades you've done to yours that you think paid off? The bearings (I'm assuming you mean on the AR not the Rega) are OK but not perfect, I might try and clean it out better. 5 hours ago, Andrews_melb said: Could an upgraded phono stage help? Only thinking that so you end up with a full TT to sell, which would be easier than selling a rega deck without tonearm. Id only guess but an old rega deck wouldnt go for too much. Yeah - good idea but i didn't list the rest of my system and my Musical Fidelity A3.2 amp was picked partly for it's phono stage albeit it's an integrated one. Gut feel is a budget separate wouldn't yield much benefit but could be off the mark? 4 hours ago, mloutfie said: Selling an old rega deck especially if it's not 24v motor won't give you much. Try to put the old ar tonearm in the rega you might have better luck selling it. Putting rb300 on the ar I reckon good idea Yeah I figure that but if it covers a rewire I'll be happy. I'm happy tackling most projects but soldering in miniature isn't my idea of fun. The thought of subbing the AR arm (basically a re-badged Jelco from that era) onto the Rega crossed my mind but the arm lengths are quite different which then means drilling a new hole in the Rega which will reduce its value to pretty much nothing. I'm a bit surprised no-one's suggested selling the Rega as is and buying another arm with the money - is the RB300 still held in high enough regard that a relatively budget arm won't improve on it? Cheers Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andrews_melb Posted March 3, 2018 Share Posted March 3, 2018 no worries, i havnt heard your amp. I like my graham slee reflex more than my internal phono on the rega elex. When i bought the slee unit it changed everything for the better in my system. At the time i was running a 2m blue into it on a rega rp3.. ive moved speakers and amps but always kept with the phono stage, i love it. i thought that rb300 was well regarded Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andrews_melb Posted March 4, 2018 Share Posted March 4, 2018 @JRF i think someones selling the rb300 with rewire on here for about $500, saw it earlier today. At least you can follow the sale and get an idea on price Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
r3x Posted March 4, 2018 Share Posted March 4, 2018 (edited) On 03/03/2018 at 9:04 PM, JRF said: Surprisingly the motor appears fine and is the original, I did replace the Rega motor a number of years ago with the upgrade model but it's not the new 24v version. Any particular motor you'd recommend, I've not dug into this area yet? Any other upgrades you've done to yours that you think paid off? The bearings (I'm assuming you mean on the AR not the Rega) are OK but not perfect, I might try and clean it out better. I tried messing around with the hurst motor, trying to stop the shaft from chattering on the sleeve bearing (even replacing sleeves with ball bearings), messing about with resistors and capacitor networks to try and get a perfect 90 phase offset and equal lower voltages. I gave up in the end. Tried a DC (actually a mechanically commutated AC) motor. Something about them sucks the pace out of the deck. Dunno why. I ended up make a carbon fibre/cedar subchassis and using linn bits, bearings, subplatter etc castoff from someone elses upgrade. It's in storage now. I use a big old kenwood DD mostly. Cheers, Rex Edited March 4, 2018 by r3x clarification Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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