Seems to be a good selection mid-priced (have I lost normal perspective $$?) proper hifi turntables at the moment. 🤓

Well Tempered Classic (needs minor repair / rewire)

SOTA Sapphire

Thorens TD-320

Roksan Xerxes (mentioned previously, with the Nima unipivot arm)

Nice to see a few more options outside the normal fodder. (Yes, I have been reflecting on Citroen ‘s treasure hoard of record players this week 🤔 )

I have no idea why I passed on a Well Tempered Classic for I think was about $400 quite a few years ago. Probably because I still had the Amadeus. Great buying, even with the minor rewire required.

Sota was another 80's TT out of my league at the time but admired from afar. $850 sans arm may be pushing it.

The WT would be my pick but FFS that is not a WT Classic !

Classic is a name used by Transparent when they were building WTs

Easy to spot - a Classic has a round motor in a cut-out, enclosed by the plinth.

Dunno what happened to the clamp, it should be black.

Repair is easy-ish but may jar some people's aesthetic sensibilities.

To fix the arm wire, first forget about pulling the old wire out of the arm tube, it's near-impossible.

The expedient path is to run the new wire along the outside of the armtube to the termination block.

PS - before I bought my WT I had a 3 way shootout with my modded Linn Sondek + Ittok vs. SOTA Sapphire vs. Fidelity Research FR64fx vs. original Well Tempered Turntable.

Cartridge was my old Koetsu Red/Rosewood.

The WT made the SOTA sound slow and sluggish, the modded Linn held up slightly better but was closed in, opaque sounding.

Kept that WTT for 25 years !

Good tips, michaelw thanks.
Not that I neeeeeeed another record player…
But, well, good to know. 🤓

Same as you Citroën, most of these (and many others) are “unrequited loves” from a time when they were simply out-of-my-league.

more WT tips...

The TM one appears to have the motor in the wrong position, that brick carrying the motor has a mark stamped on the side, to position correctly you align it with a corresponding mark on the motor cut-out.

All the oWTT I've seen have the on/off switch at 7 o'clock.

And a biggy....

The WTT plinth is contructed of three layers of MDF, separated with rubbery, sticky pads.

Over time these pads soften and the layers can move out of alignment.

It doesn't affect the sound but can look very funky.

The only fix is to strip the turntable down and re-assemble the layers with new sticky pads.

This is great stuff. I have only digital but will consider the WT if it doesn't go too high.