First of all, thanks to all the informed and knowledgeable posters on this board for making such an invaluable site.
At the beginning of April I decided to attempt to build a simple record lathe, as a novel solution to the problem of secure data destruction of old CD-Rs/DVD-Rs with personal information; I had discovered via YouTube that old CDs make quite good recording blanks for primitive record cutting. In spite of having no real technical knowledge, I built my machine, with constant reference to this and other sites for information, using some old pieces of chipboard, about thirty pounds' worth of hardware, and a great many 'found' and recycled objects. The full story of its construction is described in agonising detail on my website here.
I've got to the stage now when I think it's about as good as it's going to get, using the materials I had at my disposal. It indents, rather than cuts, old CDs and pieces of polycarbonate (Lexan, Makrolon). There are a number of areas for improvement, of course, since it was built largely out of rubbish, but there are two specific problems I'd really like to try to resolve as a priority.
Firstly, although the quality of the sound isn't bad at all, the sound level on the indented records is quite low - certainly well below the level of a commercially cut record. I have used two small tweeters to make the cutting head, and these are rated at 8 watts. Would using similarly sized tweeters, but with a much higher power rating, say 40 - 50 watts, result in a louder record, or should I tackle the problem in some other way?
Secondly, I am using a steel gramophone needle to indent with, which means that the records have to be played back with a stylus for 78rpm records. I'd like to be able to cut a finer groove so that I can use an LP stylus for playback. Is it possible to adapt a gramophone needle (or other piece of ironmongery) so that it will cut such a groove, and how would I do it?
Any help and advice that you can give would be very greatly appreciated! Thanks in advance
David
Home-made CD/Lexan lathe: advice sought
Moderators: piaptk, tragwag, Steve E., Aussie0zborn
-
pentlandsound
- Posts: 66
- Joined: Mon May 16, 2011 11:25 am
- Location: Edinburgh, Scotland
Hi David,
Bravo! Great job! Looks like you did your homework and came up with a real nice solution. You seem to be getting great results. Keep up the excellent work. The web site is very well done. I should really take the time to document my experiments as well as you have.
What did you do to attempt to EQ the head? Have you determined the mechanical resonance/damping of your design?
You should be able to emboss grooves capable of being played back on a standard pickup using a gramophne stylus, you just may need make the point a bit finer. Embossing has some technical limits that can affect the high frequency performance along with the fact that the CD requires you to cut at small diameters. If you PM me with you email, I can send you a paper on the subject.
I'm not sure if going to a larger power handling driver will yeild better results. I fear as you increase the size of the driver, the increaed moving mass will negate any potential gain in output level. I think there are some fundamental physical limits to to much force you can develop in such a small space with a given magnet type. The pro Neumann heads can't handle that much more power than your off the shelf tweeters can. They have just optimised the magnetics and winding (along with some improved cooling) and system mass to get the extra few db. The best thing you can do is to reduce moving mass and optimize the stiffness of your suspension. How much power have you pumped into the drivers? Have reached a power amp or mechanical limit? Have you blow up one of your tweeters yet?
Looking forward to seeing how you progress. I know I've learned a ton playing with this stuff.
Mark
Bravo! Great job! Looks like you did your homework and came up with a real nice solution. You seem to be getting great results. Keep up the excellent work. The web site is very well done. I should really take the time to document my experiments as well as you have.
What did you do to attempt to EQ the head? Have you determined the mechanical resonance/damping of your design?
You should be able to emboss grooves capable of being played back on a standard pickup using a gramophne stylus, you just may need make the point a bit finer. Embossing has some technical limits that can affect the high frequency performance along with the fact that the CD requires you to cut at small diameters. If you PM me with you email, I can send you a paper on the subject.
I'm not sure if going to a larger power handling driver will yeild better results. I fear as you increase the size of the driver, the increaed moving mass will negate any potential gain in output level. I think there are some fundamental physical limits to to much force you can develop in such a small space with a given magnet type. The pro Neumann heads can't handle that much more power than your off the shelf tweeters can. They have just optimised the magnetics and winding (along with some improved cooling) and system mass to get the extra few db. The best thing you can do is to reduce moving mass and optimize the stiffness of your suspension. How much power have you pumped into the drivers? Have reached a power amp or mechanical limit? Have you blow up one of your tweeters yet?
Looking forward to seeing how you progress. I know I've learned a ton playing with this stuff.
Mark
-
pentlandsound
- Posts: 66
- Joined: Mon May 16, 2011 11:25 am
- Location: Edinburgh, Scotland
Hi Mark, emidisc - many thanks for reviewing my documentation and providing comments!
My progress so far has been based purely on experimentation, rather than any exact science, working things out by simple trial and error and making adjustments to get the best results I can. As you pointed out, you do find out a great deal by doing this, although progress can be slow!
I have also been experimenting with the settings in the sound editor, Audacity, and have had better results by cutting out the high frequencies, starting the drop about 6KHz and reducing to zero volume at 20KHz. Then apply the "inverse RIAA" to the remaining signal, and finally slow down by ~25% and cut at 33rpm. This produces a 45rpm disc that is at least a pleasure rather than a trial to listen to, although it isn't very hi-fi.
Next task is to try sharpening the needles, à la King, so that the point is a truncated cone of 45°; and also making a new head with a less "massive" stylus assembly... still figuring this last one out, though - will perhaps build it out of Lexan off-cuts! My first cutting head, using a single tweeter, lasted about 15 minutes because I made the novice mistake of turning the amplifier up much too high. So far, its replacement (with two speakers and greatly improved sound quality) is still in business, and I'm much more careful about the volume level, having learned not to push the small speakers too hard. If it sounds as though they are distorting, the level is too high.
I'll post reports of any progress here and on my website. Thanks all who replied/PMd.
David
My progress so far has been based purely on experimentation, rather than any exact science, working things out by simple trial and error and making adjustments to get the best results I can. As you pointed out, you do find out a great deal by doing this, although progress can be slow!
I have also been experimenting with the settings in the sound editor, Audacity, and have had better results by cutting out the high frequencies, starting the drop about 6KHz and reducing to zero volume at 20KHz. Then apply the "inverse RIAA" to the remaining signal, and finally slow down by ~25% and cut at 33rpm. This produces a 45rpm disc that is at least a pleasure rather than a trial to listen to, although it isn't very hi-fi.
Next task is to try sharpening the needles, à la King, so that the point is a truncated cone of 45°; and also making a new head with a less "massive" stylus assembly... still figuring this last one out, though - will perhaps build it out of Lexan off-cuts! My first cutting head, using a single tweeter, lasted about 15 minutes because I made the novice mistake of turning the amplifier up much too high. So far, its replacement (with two speakers and greatly improved sound quality) is still in business, and I'm much more careful about the volume level, having learned not to push the small speakers too hard. If it sounds as though they are distorting, the level is too high.
I'll post reports of any progress here and on my website. Thanks all who replied/PMd.
David
David,
you have done a very nice job there. Good progress. Good to see a DIY lathe and the cutter born.
I have done a lot of DIY lathe and cutter. There is a lot to learn and to do.
I just want to point you that every vibrating part should be as light as possible and bonded very good to each other. that includes your plastic cones from the speakers, links to the stylus holder and etc.
Use sweeters as they should do the work. With a nice setup it should handle 10-12khz. And with tweeking maybe more. I do not have much time now for this but someday I will resume the work with the cutter.
So thats the basic part to try.
Oh and one more thing, if you reproducing stylus is not jumping off and skipping the record then the needle should be OK. Some time ago I did a test cut and tried to play with a very old portable record player. It has the stylus that is good for 78's 45's . It sounded very nice, but when I tried to listen on normal microgroove stylus it was very bad. so it showed that the stylus wasn't sharp enough.
Keep it up!
you have done a very nice job there. Good progress. Good to see a DIY lathe and the cutter born.
I have done a lot of DIY lathe and cutter. There is a lot to learn and to do.
I just want to point you that every vibrating part should be as light as possible and bonded very good to each other. that includes your plastic cones from the speakers, links to the stylus holder and etc.
Use sweeters as they should do the work. With a nice setup it should handle 10-12khz. And with tweeking maybe more. I do not have much time now for this but someday I will resume the work with the cutter.
So thats the basic part to try.
Oh and one more thing, if you reproducing stylus is not jumping off and skipping the record then the needle should be OK. Some time ago I did a test cut and tried to play with a very old portable record player. It has the stylus that is good for 78's 45's . It sounded very nice, but when I tried to listen on normal microgroove stylus it was very bad. so it showed that the stylus wasn't sharp enough.
Keep it up!
-
pentlandsound
- Posts: 66
- Joined: Mon May 16, 2011 11:25 am
- Location: Edinburgh, Scotland
Hi again, and thanks "d" for your comments! Since my last update I've made a couple of minor improvements to my disc recorder - replacing the battered Meccano I'd used for the feedscrew with a rather better quality pulley and bearings. Result is a much more even spiral on my finished records.
Most of my work recently has been in experimenting with the signal passed to the cutter head, trying out different equalisations and speeds. The best results so far were obtained by slowing down the original to about four-sevenths of normal speed and cutting at 45rpm. This brings most of the "important" frequencies within the range of my highly primitive home-built cutter head and yields a 78rpm disc that actually sounds quite reasonable.
The brick wall is now the problem of torque - my Leak Delta (ie Lenco 75) turntable, which I use for cutting, can't provide quite enough of it. Cutting at speeds of 33rpm or less makes for a very wobbly sounding record, as the turntable struggles to cope with the extra drag caused by the cutting stylus. By speeding things up to 45rpm, the rotating platter has a bit more oomph and the resulting 78rpm record is less wobbly.
This minimises, rather than removes, the problem of the torque being inadequate. As the cutting stylus approaches the centre of the blank, the turntable speeds up slightly, and the record thus drops slightly in pitch during playback. This is not generally noticeable unless you lift the playback stylus at the end of the record and put it back to the start - or if you try and play an instrument along with the record!
So the next major upgrade has to be a new turntable with enough torque in its motor to overcome this. I've heard some good things about the Technics SL1210, and just recently some better things about the Numark TTX-1, and would ask any Trolls with experience of cutting on DJ turntables for any advice they can provide! The stipulation is that the platter has to cope with a stylus pressure of 150 - 200 grams at a point 15 centimetres from the centre without wobbling or losing speed. (I'd also like 16 and 78rpm if possible....)
Thanks in advance for any assistance.
David
Most of my work recently has been in experimenting with the signal passed to the cutter head, trying out different equalisations and speeds. The best results so far were obtained by slowing down the original to about four-sevenths of normal speed and cutting at 45rpm. This brings most of the "important" frequencies within the range of my highly primitive home-built cutter head and yields a 78rpm disc that actually sounds quite reasonable.
The brick wall is now the problem of torque - my Leak Delta (ie Lenco 75) turntable, which I use for cutting, can't provide quite enough of it. Cutting at speeds of 33rpm or less makes for a very wobbly sounding record, as the turntable struggles to cope with the extra drag caused by the cutting stylus. By speeding things up to 45rpm, the rotating platter has a bit more oomph and the resulting 78rpm record is less wobbly.
This minimises, rather than removes, the problem of the torque being inadequate. As the cutting stylus approaches the centre of the blank, the turntable speeds up slightly, and the record thus drops slightly in pitch during playback. This is not generally noticeable unless you lift the playback stylus at the end of the record and put it back to the start - or if you try and play an instrument along with the record!
So the next major upgrade has to be a new turntable with enough torque in its motor to overcome this. I've heard some good things about the Technics SL1210, and just recently some better things about the Numark TTX-1, and would ask any Trolls with experience of cutting on DJ turntables for any advice they can provide! The stipulation is that the platter has to cope with a stylus pressure of 150 - 200 grams at a point 15 centimetres from the centre without wobbling or losing speed. (I'd also like 16 and 78rpm if possible....)
Thanks in advance for any assistance.
David
The ultimate would be a technics sp-10 mk3. Truly, they provide more torque than most TT's (16 kg/cm-2). But, they are expensive and hard to come by.
You can use a 1210 with the reistor mod to give it a little extra torque.
You can also find motors for older lathes like prestos or what not. They would also be good for your project.
You can use a 1210 with the reistor mod to give it a little extra torque.
You can also find motors for older lathes like prestos or what not. They would also be good for your project.
Cutting, Inventing & Innovating
Groove Graphics, VMS Halfnuts, MIDI Automation, Professional Stereo Feedback Cutterheads, and Pesto 1-D Cutterhead Clones
Cutterhead Repair: Recoiling, Cleaning, Cloning of Screws, Dampers & More
http://mantra.audio
Groove Graphics, VMS Halfnuts, MIDI Automation, Professional Stereo Feedback Cutterheads, and Pesto 1-D Cutterhead Clones
Cutterhead Repair: Recoiling, Cleaning, Cloning of Screws, Dampers & More
http://mantra.audio
-
pentlandsound
- Posts: 66
- Joined: Mon May 16, 2011 11:25 am
- Location: Edinburgh, Scotland
Once again, may I begin by extending my thanks to the many experts who have continued to post interesting and extremely useful information to this forum.
I began my experiments with analogue disc recording about 18 months ago, starting with a home-made clockwork lathe flung together from the remnants of a wind-up gramophone, a few off-cuts of wood and some elderly Meccano, as mentioned in my earlier posts from around that time. Since then I've attempted to improve on it, really just learning and picking things up as I go, largely from this site and others, including Markrob's (and re-watching that Peter King news item on YouTube about a hundred times...)
All my lathes use a moving turntable under a fixed recording head; I figured from day one that, given my limited construction skills, the machine would be more likely to work that way. I've just finished assembling the Mk. 3 version, and have posted a brief video about it on YouTube for anyone who might be interested.
One of my YouTube viewers in the USA was kind enough to send me a nearly-new cutting stylus (as opposed to embossing point). This is of the "Truetone" brand and appears to be made of steel. I'd be grateful for any information about how to deploy this as I don't want to ruin it straight away!
- what is the correct cutting angle - upright (90 deg), 5 deg facing / trailing, etc
- what can I cut with it - would it work on polycarbonate or acrylic?
Secondly, has anyone used black polycarbonate for embossing? I think there was a thread on this site about it some time ago, but it seemed inconclusive. The black material is utterly unobtainable in Britain, but I did find and try out something called 'opal' which was unacceptably noisy. Is black usable?
Thanks to all
David
13.10.2012
I began my experiments with analogue disc recording about 18 months ago, starting with a home-made clockwork lathe flung together from the remnants of a wind-up gramophone, a few off-cuts of wood and some elderly Meccano, as mentioned in my earlier posts from around that time. Since then I've attempted to improve on it, really just learning and picking things up as I go, largely from this site and others, including Markrob's (and re-watching that Peter King news item on YouTube about a hundred times...)
All my lathes use a moving turntable under a fixed recording head; I figured from day one that, given my limited construction skills, the machine would be more likely to work that way. I've just finished assembling the Mk. 3 version, and have posted a brief video about it on YouTube for anyone who might be interested.
One of my YouTube viewers in the USA was kind enough to send me a nearly-new cutting stylus (as opposed to embossing point). This is of the "Truetone" brand and appears to be made of steel. I'd be grateful for any information about how to deploy this as I don't want to ruin it straight away!
- what is the correct cutting angle - upright (90 deg), 5 deg facing / trailing, etc
- what can I cut with it - would it work on polycarbonate or acrylic?
Secondly, has anyone used black polycarbonate for embossing? I think there was a thread on this site about it some time ago, but it seemed inconclusive. The black material is utterly unobtainable in Britain, but I did find and try out something called 'opal' which was unacceptably noisy. Is black usable?
Thanks to all
David
13.10.2012
-
Angus McCarthy
- Posts: 760
- Joined: Mon Aug 23, 2010 6:22 pm
- Location: Bloomsburg, PA, USA
5 degrees leaning toward the oncoming disc is the most commonly quoted angle. You want to scrape out the groove rather than dig in. It is a steel needle, though, and will not last long at all compared to a jewel - they were the "disposable" styli meant more for the cardboard mailer discs than any kind of archival lacquer. You could always flip it over and do some higher-precision embossings.pentlandsound wrote:One of my YouTube viewers in the USA was kind enough to send me a nearly-new cutting stylus (as opposed to embossing point). This is of the "Truetone" brand and appears to be made of steel. I'd be grateful for any information about how to deploy this as I don't want to ruin it straight away!
- what is the correct cutting angle - upright (90 deg), 5 deg facing / trailing, etc
- what can I cut with it - would it work on polycarbonate or acrylic?
Secondly, has anyone used black polycarbonate for embossing? I think there was a thread on this site about it some time ago, but it seemed inconclusive. The black material is utterly unobtainable in Britain, but I did find and try out something called 'opal' which was unacceptably noisy. Is black usable?
Thanks to all
David
13.10.2012
Everything I've heard about the noise level of colored polycarb in general, and opaque in particular, has dissuaded me from ever trying to cut on it. It's a matter of the extra dyes and fillers they have to put in to obtain that color.
-
pentlandsound
- Posts: 66
- Joined: Mon May 16, 2011 11:25 am
- Location: Edinburgh, Scotland
Thanks! Yes, the blog is gone (for now); the annual sub was due, and my hosting service wanted rather more money to keep my website up than I was prepared to pay. Now looking for a cheaper home for my site!chaosbc wrote:pentlandsound, I am one of your follower.
The progress you made are tremendous and very impressive ! Congratulations ! Your blog is not online anymore so I though you gave up.
Good to see you did not and the machine is better than ever !
Thanks for this information. I was fairly confident that the angle should be closer to vertical than for embossing with a conical stylus, but not sure which way.Angus McCarthy wrote:
5 degrees leaning toward the oncoming disc is the most commonly quoted angle. You want to scrape out the groove rather than dig in. It is a steel needle, though, and will not last long at all compared to a jewel - they were the "disposable" styli meant more for the cardboard mailer discs than any kind of archival lacquer. You could always flip it over and do some higher-precision embossings.
I wondered about this. The 'opal' material that I did manage to find - a sort of off-white - took an embossed groove as well as the clear material, but the noise level was very high - a bit like playing a shellac 78 with the treble cranked right up. I have made a couple of experiments with black acrylic; it is possible to emboss a groove with a steel stylus; however the groove is very shallow and will only play if anti-skate and tracking weight are carefully set. That said, the sound I got from embossed acrylic was pretty good. The problem is cutting and drilling it without ending up with a workshop full of shards (and you can forget all about trying to cut it into neat circles...)!Angus McCarthy wrote: Everything I've heard about the noise level of colored polycarb in general, and opaque in particular, has dissuaded me from ever trying to cut on it. It's a matter of the extra dyes and fillers they have to put in to obtain that color.
I would second the embossing suggestion.
Cutting on these materials other than lacquer have always been less than repeatable for me.
Embossing has been more successful, more of the time.
search for the thread 'leaning back'
great info there.
Cutting on these materials other than lacquer have always been less than repeatable for me.
Embossing has been more successful, more of the time.
search for the thread 'leaning back'
great info there.
making lathe cuts on a Presto 6N, HIFI stereo cuts on vinylrecorder
at Audio Geography Studios, Providence, RI USA
http://www.audiogeography.com
at Audio Geography Studios, Providence, RI USA
http://www.audiogeography.com
I downloaded your blog in pdf before it was down ...
There is a lot of usefull infos.
here it is: http://chaosbc.free.fr/784533.pdf
There is a lot of usefull infos.
here it is: http://chaosbc.free.fr/784533.pdf
-
pentlandsound
- Posts: 66
- Joined: Mon May 16, 2011 11:25 am
- Location: Edinburgh, Scotland
Re: Home-made CD/Lexan lathe: advice sought
Thought I'd resurrect this ancient thread, and post a bit of a summary of how things are going with my lathe project. Firstly, my apologies for not being a regular or copious poster to this site: this is my twentieth post in a little over two-and-a-half years; although I am learning as I go, I have still got a great deal to learn, and can't really contribute much beyond what other, far more experienced and knowledgeable people have already said.
Anyway, for what it's worth:
My lathe is in its third incarnation, still using the tried and trusted method of moving the turntable under a stationary recording head. The turntable sits on a 'sled' - a kind of drawer without sides - which is opened very slowly by a leadscrew mechanism. This mechanism is controlled by an Arduino board connected to a stepper motor, and I wrote some software to enable a playlist of music file tracks to be drawn up, allowing one to set groove pitch, spacing, run-ins and run-outs etc. The software controls the speed of the leadscrew while playing the music tracks through the amplifier and recording head using the Windows media player object library. A bit like CD-R software for records.
Some of you have already asked about this software. Although it works tolerably well, it still has a tendency to go wrong (my asynchronous programming was never up to much), and so it isn't really in a releasable state yet. Your forbearance is appreciated.
I have also built a new recording head, version 5. Like its four predecessors, it indents (or embosses) a groove rather than 'cutting' one. No material is removed from the disc surface. Hat-tip to markrob, whose cutterhead design (depicted and described at length in another thread) I adapted, even using the same Digikey speakers. The sound quality I found to be a huge step up from my version 4, and the whole thing cost me about twenty pounds to build, much of which was postage! For styli I use sharpened 78rpm steel gramophone needles, cost: about threepence each. If this expense seems too lavish, de-headed half-inch panel pins, suitably sharpened, also work.
I use two types of media for recording. The first is the traditional polycarbonate, 1mm thick, ordered in A3 (420x297mm) sheets. You can just about squeeze three single-size discs out of one sheet, if you don't mind their being 174mm across instead of 175. The other medium I discovered to be usable is 240-micron craft acetate, which enables you to re-live the 80s era of typewritten Gestetnered fanzines with the obligatory free flexidisc. One brand, Papermania, is particularly good, and its acetate sheets are 12" square, so you can include a free LP with your 'zine if you wish.
One continual bugbear I've had since day one is low volume on the recorded discs. Quite recently I've discovered a big improvement by making the stylus as short as possible, so that only about 3 - 4mm of shank sticks out of the bottom of the stylus holder, and reducing the angle off vertical from the traditional 30 degrees for embossing to 15 - 20 degrees. (This does increase surface noise by a bit, but the increased volume of sound more than makes up for it. Perhaps a heat-lamp might help.) My latest discs, compared to a standard 5cm/s 1K level test record, peak at about +3dB.
One last thing: this venture - and to a great extent this site - have also inspired and motivated me to return to the classroom: this autumn I enrolled at the local university, as a mature student, to read electrical and mechanical engineering. Thanks to all who've answered my queries, either directly or indirectly.
Will update this thread as and when necessary!
David
9 December 2013
Anyway, for what it's worth:
My lathe is in its third incarnation, still using the tried and trusted method of moving the turntable under a stationary recording head. The turntable sits on a 'sled' - a kind of drawer without sides - which is opened very slowly by a leadscrew mechanism. This mechanism is controlled by an Arduino board connected to a stepper motor, and I wrote some software to enable a playlist of music file tracks to be drawn up, allowing one to set groove pitch, spacing, run-ins and run-outs etc. The software controls the speed of the leadscrew while playing the music tracks through the amplifier and recording head using the Windows media player object library. A bit like CD-R software for records.
Some of you have already asked about this software. Although it works tolerably well, it still has a tendency to go wrong (my asynchronous programming was never up to much), and so it isn't really in a releasable state yet. Your forbearance is appreciated.
I have also built a new recording head, version 5. Like its four predecessors, it indents (or embosses) a groove rather than 'cutting' one. No material is removed from the disc surface. Hat-tip to markrob, whose cutterhead design (depicted and described at length in another thread) I adapted, even using the same Digikey speakers. The sound quality I found to be a huge step up from my version 4, and the whole thing cost me about twenty pounds to build, much of which was postage! For styli I use sharpened 78rpm steel gramophone needles, cost: about threepence each. If this expense seems too lavish, de-headed half-inch panel pins, suitably sharpened, also work.
I use two types of media for recording. The first is the traditional polycarbonate, 1mm thick, ordered in A3 (420x297mm) sheets. You can just about squeeze three single-size discs out of one sheet, if you don't mind their being 174mm across instead of 175. The other medium I discovered to be usable is 240-micron craft acetate, which enables you to re-live the 80s era of typewritten Gestetnered fanzines with the obligatory free flexidisc. One brand, Papermania, is particularly good, and its acetate sheets are 12" square, so you can include a free LP with your 'zine if you wish.
One continual bugbear I've had since day one is low volume on the recorded discs. Quite recently I've discovered a big improvement by making the stylus as short as possible, so that only about 3 - 4mm of shank sticks out of the bottom of the stylus holder, and reducing the angle off vertical from the traditional 30 degrees for embossing to 15 - 20 degrees. (This does increase surface noise by a bit, but the increased volume of sound more than makes up for it. Perhaps a heat-lamp might help.) My latest discs, compared to a standard 5cm/s 1K level test record, peak at about +3dB.
One last thing: this venture - and to a great extent this site - have also inspired and motivated me to return to the classroom: this autumn I enrolled at the local university, as a mature student, to read electrical and mechanical engineering. Thanks to all who've answered my queries, either directly or indirectly.
Will update this thread as and when necessary!
David
9 December 2013
-
pohsuan1018
- Posts: 1
- Joined: Sat Jan 24, 2015 7:23 am
Re: Home-made CD/Lexan lathe: advice sought
Hey David,
I'm building a record lathe too, and also currently using a gramophone needle to indent with. It weighs around 40 grams and tilts at 45 degrees. This setting works well for regular cd discs, but doesn't emboss polycarbonate discs and scratches it while recording. I've tried different angles and weight, but couldn't find the sweat spot. Wondering if you can give me some advice? Thanks!
Frank
I'm building a record lathe too, and also currently using a gramophone needle to indent with. It weighs around 40 grams and tilts at 45 degrees. This setting works well for regular cd discs, but doesn't emboss polycarbonate discs and scratches it while recording. I've tried different angles and weight, but couldn't find the sweat spot. Wondering if you can give me some advice? Thanks!
Frank