Pioneer PL71

[SteveA2]

It happened.
- Wasn't a close contest at all I'm afraid.
- Have ordered the Versalex - I just had to have one.

Steve

[jazzzman]

I have been watching this thread with interest, as I am working on a PL-55X which has the same motor, speed switches etc. (as far as I can tell, the difference seems to be the tonearm and the auto-return mechanism on the 55X). I am about to order the caps for the motor board and the psu. Can anyone give me any advice on the types of caps to use? I have heard that the Panasonic FC series are frequently used in recaps. Does anyone know if those would work for this application?
One other question, I see that the caps on the motorboard all have blue colored cans and the caps on the psu have black colored cans. Does the color difference suggest that I need to use different types of caps for the two different applications?
Thanks in advance for any help anyone can provide.

[rhomanski]

Mainly I use two kinds of electrolytics, Nichicon PW which is a low impedance cap. For power supplies and other general duties. Also Nichicon KL series which is a low noise cap for use in the signal path of amps and the like. Most pioneer caps will have a code on them I.E. CE04 or such, these are replaced with PW series. As a general rule of thumb, The small sky blue caps and small orange are low noise, black and medium blue are low impedance. Of course Panasonic are just as good but harder to find. Go to Mouser.com and put in your values and you will usually find a PW or KL in that size. For large capacitors it pays to shop around. I recently did an amplifier and Mouser wanted $200 for one capacitor. Newark got me both caps for the same price. I just had to wait for the pair to come from England.

Regards,

Ron.

[jazzzman]

Thanks, Rhomanski. I believe the blue on the motor board is medium. So I should be able to use PW caps for both. Of course, there is no audio signal going through any of these caps. Do you recall if you used PW caps for both the motor board and psu?
Thanks again.

[rhomanski]

Yes, I would stick with PW. I did a PL-630 last winter and used PW in it. I'll be doing a Sansui SR-717 eventually and I'll be doing it with PW. The others are belt drive and newer, no need to do them yet.

Regards,

Ron.

[jazzzman]

Thanks again, I will take your suggestion. I also have a PL-610 that I plan to work on next, but that might not be for a while.

[Bob in STL]

Does anyone know, if the PL 71 an upgrade over the PL 41?

How do the tone arms and the overall sound compare?

thanks, Bob

[jazzzman]

The PL-71 is DD, The PL-41 is belt driven. The PL-71 has a better tonearm that has adjustable VTA.