Expunging the 1980s - removing black ash finish

My only slight disappointment is that my perspex lid is a dark smoke tint, and you don't really see the full effect with the lid down. I can't tell from the picture that @billshurv posted if he has a lighter tint that might have been sold for the real wood effect options.
 
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Mine is also smoked. lighting isn't good in the living room so hard to get a picture but this is what is looks like when lit up on it's shelves.



The isoplat is there as I was trying to adjust things and easier to get the skirt off when its raised. I've currently got Roksan bug #4 which is the belt vibrates at 33.3 enough that, if the lid is down you can hear it with no music playing. 45 is silent. You can see the belt vibrate and however much I try I can't get the tension spot on and am not ready to part with £££ for another factory belt.



Nice job on yours. It really does look like a posh factory finish and so much better than the boring black.
 

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I've not heard of bug #4, and have used 3rd party belts without an issue. I don't know how old your deck is but there was a modification made to the motor mount and the way the wires were dressed, that may be something to check.

The main problem that I have had is with the motor controller. I moved from the UK to the US, and then back, so I had to change from the old style one in the wooden case (dated 1985, issue 2) to a later version with the controller in a metal case and an external wallwart type PSU. That only lasted a couple of years. The PSU was cheap junk, supposedly 26V but the internal caps were way underspeced at just 25V - frankly dangerous. I complained to Roksan but they were only interested in selling me an upgraded PSU for silly money. I got a big transformer and built my own supply, fully regulated and much more stable - easily able to start from a standstill without having to manually help the platter get going.
 
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I didn't get on well with the wooden cased XPS so when the spindle on mine needed replacing on coming back from America I got the XPS3.5 in 1999 and that's been rock solid since. I belive all mods were added at that point. But the older one was a huge pain with the grunting straining start up. When I inherited a kenwood DD as a second table the difference is almost laughable.



The vibration is on the slack side of the belt and so I need to get the belt tension just right and it should go, but it's a lot of faff I don't currently have time for. As long as you play with the lid up (which they recommend) you can't hear it unless you put your ear onto it.
 
Don't you think it looks better in black? :devilr:

Actually, yes I do. the first couple of cars I looked at were dark blue and dark green and I would have definitely bought them in preference to resale red. But they both had "some issues", certainly for the price being asked. My example was relatively cheap in comparison, but needed quite a lot of work. Fortunately I could do it all myself so I was only paying for parts. And it also means you can throw in some upgrades, like a full Alfaholics uprated suspension kit. Those later model Cromodora wheels were a bitch though. It does now need a respray but the cost of changing colour from red to black, which I would love to do, may be prohibitive.
 
Personally I think alfas should be red.
The national car colour thing started in the very early 1900s with USA being given red as its national colour in the Gordon Bennett Cup of that period. Italy adopted red later in the 1920s. Ferrari have done very well with it, but I would choose a modern Ferrari in yellow, given a free choice (yeah right). Lamborghini have been good at slaying the Italy=red car myth, I'd go with something bonkers in livid green or orange.
a basket case caterham instead.
I had some spare space in a small garage and helped a mate build a Caterham in it (yes we did check it would get out of the door) but he was an idiot, and crashed it after only a couple of months, without even giving me a ride in it.