Turntables should be placed on a surface that is resistant to vibrations.
Is there a thing that subwoofers need to kept X distance from turntables to prevent hum?
As far away as you can do is best. Turntables hate subs.
A turntable is a mechanical device - the small variations in the groove that are being turned into music will have to compete with airborne vibrations from the sub. Worse still, there’s a potential for a feedback loop: low frequencies in the music will be amplified by the sub and be picked up by the turntable. So keeping them separated makes sense. Distance will depend on volume you play your music at - the louder the more chance airborne vibrations will be picked up by the turntable, so there’s no X distance rule.
@dancingsea:
Mount the turntable on a wall, and not in a corner. If on a stand or table you will just have to experiment with placement and use a fair amount of common sense. Open cavity plinth turn tables with a dust cover mounted can be slightly more sensitive to low frequency at high amplitude. Specific to your situation if you are happy with your digital rig you may just want to skip a turntable. My understanding is you do not have LPs or reasonable access to them on the island, other than mainland mail order. Unless you already have a good size LP collection it may be wise to forgo a turntable.
Typically I’d recommend otherwise, but you seem to have a peculiar set of obstacles to overcome.
Thanks for the tips. This is actually more of a rack inquiry than anything. Space is limited and being able to put a mythical turntable over the sub would be more efficient and allow different rack choices. It’s complicated by the tv needing to go on top. Music Direct is a pain because they won’t use the post office to ship to Hawaii, insisting instead on super expensive FedEx 2 day. But that’s what mother’s are for, she can forward stuff to me. And the other vinyl dealers seem more Hawaii friendly. After 30 years on Maui, I’m accustomed to such gymnastics
Remember, putting a turntable near or even on a vibrating thing is just as meaningful as putting an electron microscope on a lawnmower, it’s simply brainless, sorry for the harsh word . One shouldn’t do this with a CD player or even an amp, too.
Are you suggesting that I take the electron microscope off the lawnmower, where else am I going to put it???
It’s only brainless if one knew better and then didn’t do it. We are each born into this world with essentially zero knowledge and learn what we learn along the way. The torrent of possible things to learn is far greater than any one mind could ever possibly contain, on order of magnitude.
The wise know they don’t, and can’t know it all. The key to wisdom is the humility to ask questions. To explore. To find out. The process of such inquiry, the beginner mind, is far more intelligent than the mind that thinks it knows it all
Sure, I didn’t want to be harsh or insult those who don’t immediately realize the mechanical sensibility of such a scanning process. Imagine if the contact area of the stylus would be as big as a pinhead, the tonearm’s length would be several football fields and the movement of your subwoofer’s cabinet at least as much as a few dozen times the pinhead. This while movements of the stylus in a similar magnitude are transferred into music.
By this example you might imagine what role adjustments of the tonearm play for correct contact surface of the stylus and how much misinformation you get to the true signal by adding the subwoofer cabinet movements.
Decades ago when I visited Paul Heath in Chicago, they had a new turntable isolation platform that they were testing by placing it and a 'table directly on top of a 24" Hartley subwoofer. I didn’t stick around to hear the results.
To clarify, the original idea was to put the turntable on a small table, and have the sub under that small table. The turntable and sub would not be in actual physical contact. They would just be close by.
Ok thanks that’s different…still bad unfortunately
Didn’t the OP go with a Fluance turntable? They are great, but your subs will definitely trigger a sound that resembles a jet taking off at medium (imho) volume. You’ll think it’s broken, but it’s a result of the feedback and decoupling.
I am the OP
The Fluance was on back order. In the meantime I’ve been distracted with trying a new amp, and plotting a new rack. And the Decware ZRock2. Will it ever stop?!
Plan to come back to the Fluance though.
On the sub-under-the-turntable thing…
Best practices, yeah, yeah…
But seriously, I wouldn’t worry about it unless you have to. Don’t borrow trouble, as my mother used to say.
There are vibrations everywhere, and it the volume is really high, and the bass is booming, yeah, it might cause some unwanted rumbling. And some tables/carts/tonearms are more prone to rumble, even in perfect situations.
If it’s an issue, turn down the sub until it’s ok. If it doesn’t cause a problem, don’t sweat it. (I sometimes have to adjust my subs depending on what I’m listening to, or the general volume I’m listening at.)
Plus, there are plenty of isolation pucks/feet/pods you can try, too, if it comes to that.
Just ordered the Marantz Model 30, per Herb Reichert’s enthusiasm. It arrives Monday. Interested to see how it compares to the Hegel. The Model 30 uses the latest Hypex NCore class D modules that Buchardt, Kii, Marantz’s flagship line, Rogue’s Dragon line, and others high end brands use. Curious to see how it sounds! And it comes with a good internal phono preamp which opens the door for the Fluance.
What volume do you listen at? Do you want to “feel the bass”? I am mostly sure it will be a problem, if so. Best wishes and not borrowing trouble is an excellent plan, but I know you’ve been dabbling at this for a while and would like to see you stoked.
My listening levels peak at 80 to 85. I don’t have to put the turntable over the sub, but it would be more efficient space wise. I absolutely love bass!!
What else is a turntable inherently sensitive to? Can it be next to an amp on the rack?
Unfortunately each kind of close radiation is also not beneficial to the sound, but man will tell you it doesn’t matter (at least to medium quality setups).
Don’t place at least the cartridge side of the turntable near or directly above an amp or power cabling.