Restored Sony PS-X50

Posted by mr.bear (A) on July 26, 2017 at 15:28:13

Thanks for everybody's help on this. AA is a great resource!

Just finished restoring this sweet vintage Sony PS-X50 D.D. turntable: unfroze the motor bearing, speed is stable, all controls working, restored the damped cueing, resoldered some suspicious looking stuff, and added a new shielded power cable and phono leads.

The phono leads are derived from an "up-cycled" Audioquest silver-plated component video cable. Originally comprising 3 nice coax leads in a snake, I kept 2 with RCA's and one has just the shield connected for the ground lead. Looks pretty good and sounds nicer than the original Sony leads which by comparison sounded a bit hollow, maybe a bit rolled-off.

My old Dynavector XX-1 that I had rebuilt by Benz runs into a DIY S.U.T. The transformer was removed from inside a vintage Luxman preamp and wired with all silver and good stuff, captive output leads made from more Audioquest component video cable. The transformer, when it was in the Lux preamp, was a great match for the Dynavector and now it lives in that little box and sounds great through my B&K Pro-10MC. This is a worthwhile low-cost option if you happen across one of the erly solid-state, M.C. capable Lux models that uses transformers. I sold the preamp (clearly stating it had no MC) for more than I paid for it so got the trafo for free, essentially.

The arm on the Sony is a beautiful thing- very smooth, solid, relatively massive, beautiful bearings, on-the-fly VTA adjust- all that and it's semi auto and works like a charm. There is absolutely no contact of the mechanism and the arm during play, the end-o'-disc is detected by a shutter and photocell! It just needed patience for a few days of removing all the dried caked grease, adding cueing damping silicone fluid, lubing and tweaking everything.

I'm just listening via my headphone amp now. The arm/cart tracks perfectly, is dead silent when it's supposed to, and the sound: great octave-to-octave balance, clear, with "air" around the instruments as the golden-ears say. The Dyna has never sounded better. Those old Sony's are well-made units, having just spent a week in this one's innards.

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Topic - Restored Sony PS-X50 - mr.bear 15:28:13 07/26/17 (5)

Upgraded Sony PS-X555ES - jtpzenith 18:11:50 07/28/17 (0)

did you replace al the electrolytic caps in it? - Penguin 10:22:22 07/27/17 (1)

RE: did you replace al the electrolytic caps in it? - mr.bear 20:29:52 07/27/17 (0)

RE: Restored Sony PS-X50 - Douger 07:56:27 07/27/17 (1)

RE: I have a little hoard of Radio Shack clamps! - mr.bear 10:44:42 07/27/17 (0)

Restored Sony PS-X50

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