technics 1210 tonearm height

[Arnold_the_cat]

Hi, I was wondering if anyone can help a newbie. I have bought some technics 1210 mk5's and they have recently been transported to a friends house. When i got them there i noticed that the needles hieght above the deck differed between the decks. Both tone arms where locked in place and both decks had the height adjustment set the same. The tonearms didn't look bent and it has worried me that i have just damaged some very expensive decks. Are the decks likely to have been damaged in transport or does technics sometimes just set the heights differently independantly of the height adjustment control? Thankfully, they both play records alright. Any insight into this would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks very much.

[Netlist]

If both decks have the height control at the same value and both cartridges are the same, same cartridge holder etc…
you have a big chance one of the arms have been damaged.
Looks like the DJ put too many coins on top of the cartridge holder.

/Hugo

[loonatron]

Has one of the cartridges got one of those spacers/counterweight (upgraded from the coins! ) between it and the headshell?

I had two 1210 mk2's and one of the tonearms was heavier than the other... Can't remember if I ever figured out why! Or maybe it was those crappy DJ cartridges! (manufacturing tolerances... what are they?)

[sek]

Hi,

Both tone arms where locked in place

I don't think I understand this one? Do you mean you can acutally see a difference in cardridge height with the tonearms rested on the arm rest and locked?

I think you meant that the cardridges are sitting at different heights above the record, right?

So, why don't you just swap the cardridges between the turntables?

If the cardridge sitting lower keeps sitting lower on the other deck, you'd have an indication that it's not the tonearms...

Next would be to swap needles between cardridges in order to find out wether it's the needles or the cardridges.

I recommend you to investigate this problem further. The usual dead that SL-1200MKx decks die (despite dropping them on a corner) is the DJ getting stuck on the headshell with his arm sleve while turning around to the other deck!

This usually puts a force on the tonearm that easily wrecks all precision parts in it at once. At least the arm has to be readjusted, but I've seen arms completely ruptured out of their bearings - BTW they still played, because nobody of those hip hop posers cared to recognise the details!

Sebastian.

[Arnold_the_cat]

Thanks for the replies. When comparing the two decks, whilst the tonearms on both decks are locked still by the small black plastic clip on the arm rest, a clear difference in the height of the needles is noticeable. I would estimate that the difference is about 3-4mm. The still play fine so I'm in two minds as to whether I should just leave it or get it checked out. Thanks for the replies.

Arnold