Now, the 1966 turntable might have a cartridge which was built for a different amplifier. Does this mean I might need a whole new tonearm assembly, and will it be worth it to replace?
Now, at the end of this long hot summer, I can say that the answers are YES and YES!
The parts weren't THAT bad and the labor was basic. I got paranoid about soldering the tonearm wires, but the Stereo Doctor had sympathy on me and charged me next-to-nothing.
So now it looks good. It sounds good-enough. It's running! By gum, it's running!
Actually, gum had nothing to do with it - just don't ask me about the silly putty!
As I posted last Winter, the 1958 1210A Voice of Music record changer - branded as a Motorola Golden Voice - didn't work out. Although I thought the styling would be good, there were too many retrofitting issues involved to use it in the Motorola console. The spindle was too high, the power coupling was not compatible, and in the end - the styling wasn't "right".
So my Plan A is now a stand-alone unit in my home office.
Plan B started with advice from Gary (from the Voice of Music website) who confirmed for me that the original model of turntable in the Motorola SK-519 was the VoM 1297. Of course, all the times working with him on the 1210A, I never thought to ask if he knew what model of turntable was supposed to be in this console! Only after surrendering on the 1210A retrofit, and moving towards making it a stand-alone unit, did the topic of the console and it's original turntable come up! If there is ever a next time, I'll ask this question first! But what fun is "Plan B" if you can't have a "Plan A"! :)
So Plan B (a 1966 Voice of Music 1297-A70 branded as Motorola pictured above) is fitted into the console. Now, dear ole Dad, at some point in time, had the console mounting board cut-to-fit whatever other table he put in there. The other table is MIA, but once I had the original VoM for this console in my hands - I had to modify his modifications. It was a pretty easy fix actually and I was able to mount the new VoM in there.
The tonearm had to be filed back to retrofit the cartridge, but Gary provided me instructions - complete with pictures - on how to do this. It was pretty easy. Modern day cartridges are harder to install and align. :)
Wiring the tonearm was a simple process of routing the wires to the RCA board and soldering the ends. I'm still paranoid about soldering small parts, so the good folks at The Stereo Doctor in Augusta Maine did in the final solder. They did a great job - charged me next to nothing - and did it while I waited in less than 5 minutes (or so).
Bringing it home, I dropped it back into the console, plugged it up, and let Alice's Restaurant spin. The sound is a bit crackly, but the album is rough and I didn't even measure VTA to see if it's in range - I assume it is because these old turntables are spring-loaded and it's not really a fine-tuning type of system. But I'll double check and perhaps spin some of my newer albums on it to see how she responds.
For now, I'm just stoked that the original turntable is back in the console, and it's sounding as good as I can really expect it to sound. My basement, vintage, hand-me-down, party room is starting to shape up!
From here my next steps are to:
1) Add up the money spent on both Plan A and Plan B
2) Give the turntable a full check-up and fine-tune set-up
3) Start to make a plan for fixing the chips/dings in the Motorola cabinet.
4) Repair the external Reel-to-Reel and patch it in through the Motorola console.
