I got this turntable for twenty dollars at the thrift store and you're probably wondering why
because it's almost entirely made of plastic including the platter and the tonearm and even
though Gemini is a brand known for DJ equipment and it came with a felt slipmat it's obvious that
this flimsy little thing is totally unsuitable for a DJ use especially since it came with the same
red ceramic cartridge as a Crosley or Victrola but have you ever seen a turntable do this
I don't think it's meant to do that because usually turntables have stoppers to prevent
you from turning the tonearm too far because obviously if you keep swinging
this thing around eventually you could break the wires going to the tonearm
despite how cheap it is there are some good things about this turntable one is that the
platter is full size and there are lots of beginner's guides which say you should look
for a turntable with a counterweight well this one does have a counterweight so it should meet their
standards it also has 78 RPM speed and adjustable pitch control and has a volume control because
this thing has a built-in amplifier and if you buy it new it comes with a pair of external speakers
it has a list price of $149.95 but I've seen it on sale for under a hundred dollars this turntable
was also sold as the Altec Lansing ALT-900 but I believe that model has been discontinued
on the back in addition to the left and right speaker outputs you also get a power switch
the 12 volt DC power input a switch to select between phonograph and Bluetooth mode this does
not stream the audio from the turntable out to a Bluetooth speaker or headphones instead the
Bluetooth mode is an input to stream music from your phone or tablet into this so you can use it
as an amplifier it also has RCA line level audio outputs and an auto stop switch for the turntable
underneath it has rubber feet speed adjustment trimmers for 33 and 45 RPM
and grilles for where internal speakers could go if this was equipped with them but in this
case these are just empty holes because this one is designed for those external speakers
and I'm pretty sure that serial number means this one was made in 2021 so it's not that old
I can definitely tell something is not quite right with this crazy spinning
around tonearm because as soon as I turn it on the platter starts to rotate even
with the Auto Stop mode engaged which means when the tonearm reaches the
end of the record it's supposed to stop but you can obviously tell that's not happening
the first sign that something was amiss was when I approached it at the thrift store and I noticed
that the cartridge was just hanging loose like this but I thought that was no big deal because
that can happen quite easily with these snap-in cartridges when you go to try to take off the
stylus sometimes if you're a little bit too rough instead of just taking off the stylus you take
off the entire cartridge but it's quite easy to just snap back into place so that's what I did
but now when I put it down on a record the cartridge is almost completely bottoming out if
I tried to play it like this it would be rubbing against the surface of the record and I thought
that was just because they had a broken needle but I replaced it and it still does the same thing
and you may think that's because this tonearm is tracking too heavily but if I measure it
it's almost exactly five grams which is the recommended tracking force for this cartridge
so clearly this turntable suffered some kind of abuse or accident which
not only caused the tonearm to lose its end stops but also damaged the cartridge
but that's actually no big deal because I planned on replacing it anyway with
one of these cartridges with a flipover stylus which has the correct sized needle
for playing 78s I did a video a couple years ago about these which I'll include a link to
the new cartridge is installed and it's no longer bottoming out on the record
"I tell you this because as an artist I think you'll understand"
[Music]
now here's something fun what do you think will happen if we do something we're not allowed to do
on any other record player and that is put the tonearm back here when the record is spinning
think about that for a moment and then let me know if your guess was right or wrong
if you thought it was going to start playing backwards then you're just as wrong as me even
though the groove is being pushed into the stylus instead of pulled along underneath it
it still plays in the same direction
but because you can see the tracking angle of the stylus is so far off it
doesn't play nearly as well as it does going in the correct direction
yeah it skips very easily
and here's that flipover stylus you can see this side says LP
if I flip it over that side says 78. and 78s do generally sound better when played
with the correct 3 mil stylus however if the record is heavily worn it may actually sound
better with an LP stylus this one I'll try playing first with the 78 RPM stylus
sounds very crackly now I'll switch over to the LP stylus listen to the difference
there's a little bit more hiss but all those loud crackles are gone switch back to the 78 stylus
still lots of crackles LP stylus
it sounds a lot better because the smaller stylus is playing it below
the area of the groove which has been heavily worn
in case you're wondering this record is Under the Ukulele Tree by Johnny
Marvin the Ukulele Ace it was recorded on March 10th, 1926
but I have bigger plans than just using this to play 78s literally I noticed the rather generous
distance between the pivot for the tonearm and the edge of the platter and I wondered if it could be
made to play one of these things a 16 inch radio transcription disc and the answer is almost
it
does go on the spindle but doesn't quite fit under the tonearm you can see there actually
is a little bit of clearance between the edge of the record and the pivot of the tonearm but
all this stuff is in the way plus this plastic housing on the tonearm is rubbing on the record
looking inside I can see exactly why this thing is acting so weird this is the part
that's supposed to prevent the tonearm from being swung around too far it is also supposed to hit
this Auto Stop switch and cut the power to the motor when a tonearm is either at
the rest position or gets close to the middle of the record and it's just hanging loose like this
which means the tonearm is free to swing all the way around and the motor is running continuously
I now have a bunch of leftover parts and a rather janky turntable capable of playing 16-inch
broadcast transcription records I removed all the hardware of the tonearm rest and the cueing
lever so now it is imperative to use the stylus guard when you're not using the turntable I also
removed the c-clip holding the tonearm pivot in the base allowing it to be raised up and
it's propped up of a piece of sponge I'll need to think of a more permanent solution for that
I also trimmed off some of this excess material from around this plastic base
allowing enough room for the 16 inch record to fit underneath it
and this was not strictly necessary by wired the output of the phono cartridge directly to the
RCA jacks on the back of the turntable so now I'm using this Radio Shack mixer because its ceramic
phono input sounds a lot better than the circuitry built into the turntable and it has a mono switch
there it is set up to play a 16 inch transcription disc and just to give you
a comparison here's a normal 12 inch LP and here's a 7 inch single and if you promise not
to tell the people who are selling professional broadcast transcription turntables for hundreds
or even thousands of dollars I'll give you some direct hookup samples of what it sounds
like this record is from the SESAC Transcriptions Library
Service it's Jazz Classics music by Maltby with Orchestra and chorus
so that's how you can take a cheap turntable that's available new today and modify it to
not only play 78 so if the correct size stylus but also 16 inch broadcast transcription records