Replacing damaged RCA leads and removing earth mods on Technics 1200 and 1210 turntables. 

I am adding a new rule. No help or questions answered unless it's related to the video and you are subscribed to the channel. It takes up to much time to reply and I am not free tech support.

Hi Lee, Excellent video sir. A soldering iron is being purchased asap. Thank you for the info. :-)

kenny dixon jr was nice surprise in the end

thanks, will be taking my old technics out of the closet and bring it back to life

This video was excellent!!!!

Good Rule: Just saw the RCA comparison video and appreciate your videos and attention to detail. I trust your opinion and can't wait to see the pitch calibration video. QQ: what guage cable did you use for the ground replacement? Soldering the ground, as seen in other videos, seemed like a good idea; until you made that comment of adding more noise to the line. So glad I saw this video mate, cheers. Also, what are your thoughts on those Mod Boxes where you can connect RCAs and ground to; any compromise to the sound using these boxes? Recently took out the twintables and want to mod a few things while DJing holiday parties for family..

Sorry I have already asked the question but this one seems more related to this video, so I allow myself to ask it again ; . I've got an old turntable from Technics model SL-B202 on which I want to replace the old original RCA cable whose leads are directly soldered to the terminals inside the unit as well. To this end, I bought high-end brand new QED RCA cables ; so far so good, but problem when I cut both cables I noticed that are not two (as 'traditionally' and as in your video ) but three separate wires in each cable sheath. Any idea how can I connect i.e. solder these 6 wires to the four-terminal circuit board of the turntable ? Many thanks in advance, Cheers from France

Hello, where do you buy your cables? replaced mine, but they were to thick

Thank you for posting this. For years, my dad could never figure out why his 1200MK2 always had a loud hum. After watching this video, I opened it up and discovered the self ground mod was performed and 2 of the tonearm wires were solder bridged which caused the grounds of the phono leads to have a short circuit. The noise is gone and he couldn't have been happier.

13:43, before putting the cover back on, always set the arm base height all the way up to 6+ . This will ensure that you leave enough wire slack inside the arm cavity for the arm base to go up and down through it's full range.

People seem to think the Technics RCA Cables are cheap but there actually very good cables especially the Gold Plated ones on later Models. There very low capacitance which is what you need for the tonearm. Thanks for sharing the video.

Great vid...topped off with a Terje's edit of Chic.

It has always eluded me why anyone would want to remove earth; its there for a reason.

Thanks for this, I removed the ground mod from a deck with this video. While I was in there I found that the pitch earth was connected to the right screw and not thr left as in this video so I rectified tbdt too. Thankyou

very elegant work , how about adding an rca adaptor (as newer models have) instead of cables, therefore users can use new rca cables anytime they want.

Don't suppose anyone knows if the older sl-110 is similar to this inside? I need to replace my RCA cables.

Hi from Australia. Why people do this is just ridiculous. Yes a ground cable is a pain if it breaks but these decks were made for audiophiles and DJs like myself......I'm 63 but I lie about my age because I can. I use a stock 1200 as my play only turntable and it is fitted with an Ortofon Black cartridge with a nude Shibata stylus. It sounds spectacular. The solution for this problem is in the new releases. You get RCA sockets and a ground spade lug and an IEE power socket so if they wear out, you buy new ones. Cheers Andrew Collins Melbourne Victoria Australia.

I happened to have a Pio DJM800 mixer schematics on my desktop. Approx 15y ago i modded my SL1200MK2 (actually i just connected the ground into the plug at the end). Now on the Pio schematics i see exactly that the minuses coming from the phono input are connected together and directly to the ground. So for a DJ mixer setup the real difference is what happens to the cable along that 1-1,5 m, might not be any kind of dealbreaker unless lot of interference and current in cables is around (but that would be an issue anyway).

Dude I could watch videos of you working on turntables all day :D This video has been coming up in my feed for years ( I think I searched for exactly this topic a while back ) I havent soldered for donkeys years, and tips on building up some skills with it? Seems like fucking it up could be catastrophic lol thanks for the vid bud! Hope you’re well

Great videos. Very helpful. Also loved the one with the different RCA leads. We'll done. Thanks mate.

wonderful video! thank you. what would you recommend for the ground wire? didn't see it in the comments and in the description. thank you :)

Thanks, for your time and efforts in showing us! Excellent recorded !! THANKS

This is the most comprehensive and clear vid I’ve seen. Thank you very much I’m going to attempt this tomorrow

Your 'Not Free Tech Support' just lost against my Gratis OCD - you left the old ground mod wire hanging! loose insde!

Thank you for this video, just did it and works fine - finally noise is gone and both channels have the same level! Great explanation.

Hi mate, are you still repairing 1210s mk2s, and if you are whereabouts are you based? as im needing new cables fitted plus 1 tonearm has a little movement in it from the screw underneath the tonearm, but i struggle with soldering a little:) nice one thanks, Paul

thank you for this vid. i have a 1200 that i could not figure out why it would not play any sound. i took a chance to replace the leads and in about a 1hr 1/2 SUCCESS! for years my 1200 has been out of commission now id like to return to the classics.....lol, thank you so much.

the tiny screws on the back of the tone arm,are they righty tighty or lefty loosy? trying to snake through wires from bottom and through front of arm-no success. those tiny screws are not surviving sl 1300

Hello, I need help fixing the anti-skate. When inset the anti-skate to 0 the arm only goes half way to the center. Also there is a rattle which seems to be coming from the gimbal

Why not use the ground mod if the mixer has the earth and the RCA ground connected and at the same potential??? I modified mine and I didn't get any noise!

I like that you remove the internal ground mod. You did explain it very nicely. I say to the customers, that the Technics engineers who thought out this deck were much smarter then we, and i don't think that there is not that much we could do better :). What i don't like that much is, that you didn't remove the old solder blobs on the pcb,i see that you have a desoldering gun, so an easy job, the tip of the solder iron, i really would suggest a chisel tip for this kind of work. The heat transfer is much faster and better and the audio cables. These chineese cheap cables are more designed for a line signal, not phono signal... due to their capacitance. The original ones are still able to get. But.. was it really in 2:22 when you flipped the turntable the whole weight on the tonearm ? :). I don't want to criticize you, just some thoughts from a colleague :).

Thankyou so much for this video very detail .

Just did mine, and it's now humming all over the place. Was so careful, added a new ground, made sure my solders were perfect. Blah.

Man....makes me wonder how much a job like this cost......

Eso me serviría para mi tocadiscos q no tiene salida RCA muchas gracias por tu vídeo

I put a small alligator clip on my ground. It works perfectly and just clamps onto ground spindles or right onto the equipment chassis'.

Surprised you didn't clean the excess solder off the board before rewiring

great vid, thanks for your time ! was able to do it myself, it works perfectly. thanks

So is that why i may be getting like static when i put a record on or lift it off

仕事が早くスムース。　スポンジを使うとはグッドアイディア。

Thanks. I just needed to see how the rca cable plastic piece went back together. Took it apart last week and forgot how it went.

Greetings from France Dj Legion, your videos are the most professional and helpful tutorials ever ! I'm going to replace my RCA cables, just ordered Pulse audio cables as you recommended but I can't find the earth cable reference, do you recommend any particulary one ?

Tops it off with some KDJ. Nice one, thanks from Vancouver

excellent information and technique.. thanks for sharing.

Would you happen to have a complete tonearm assembly for a 1210 mk5 that you would like to sell?

Great video you make it seem so simple. Going to tackle my pair of Tech's now, many thanks Lee, wish me luck! 🤞

If the PCB itself is modified correctly, the internal grounding method does and will work properly.

Thank you sir, for the information, and for using camera stands. Brilliant.

thank you 🙏 perfect tutorial

Todd terje edit :)

me again DJ Legion :) May I ask what type of solder you use and if you can recommend a brand? Cheers!

Hi there! First of all i wanted to say that i absolutely love your videos! Detailed and easy to undestand. I am texting you with a problem i have encountered and i cannot understand from where it comes. Recently i bought Technics sl1210 km2 with changed RCA, and later on i realized that one of the channels is louder than the other. Probably around 3,4 db. I noticed that while i was recording a set at home and saw that one of the channels was hitting lower that the other. I cross checked it with the master output from the mixer where it could also be seen that one of the led goes higher than the other. Just to make sure i opened ableton and run a plugin from Ozone, Imager and the signal tend to go to the left rather than stay in the middle. So until now i tried cleaning the tonearm tips as well as the catridge (nothing changed) i switched needles , mixer channels evetything basically and always one of the channels is louder. Then i ran a conductivity test with a multi meter and everything went fine there. So now i am lost and i dont know what to anymore. It appears like there is some resistence than fucks up one of the signals. Have you ever encountered something similar or have any idea of what can be the cause? Every small answer will be appreciated! Regards Grigor

can you put a rca box in instead?

as lendárias Technics MK2

Why mod ground when it’s good?

If this is really your first video I'd have to say Very Nice Job.

Get a de-soldering tool.

Why did you bother to replace the left and right audio cables if the only problem was an improper ground?

Whether a ground mod causes issues really depends on what you're plugging it into. A lot of gear ties the RCA negative to ground right at the input anyway, so when you do the ground mod you're not really changing much--you're just moving the point where the two things are connected. I'm pretty sure basically all DJ mixers are this way. However, I'm certain that there are pocket preamps, or computer audio interfaces, or stereo receivers out there that run off of an isolated power supply or uses capacitive coupling, and that means that when you do this "ground mod" you are now connecting the tonearm body to something that isn't actually ground and thus you are no longer shielding the sensitive signal wires from the interference generated by the motor. You're absolutely right that it can cause issues and I personally would never do it because the convenience isn't worth it, but I don't think it can cause ground *loops*, as there isn't actually a loop created. I might be missing something though. One thing that I am curious about is whether you could replace that ground connection with a connection to mains earth via a grounded plug (I think there are turntables out there that do this from the factory). I don't know if anyone has tried it and I haven't thought it through but it seems like it might work. I suspect the turntable ground wire is an artifact of a time when companies were hesitant to make their product require a grounded outlet.

Good Video Thanks

Why do people do that grounding mod in the first place?

Great. Thanks

What is the brand of the black needle nose pliers used to cut the ground wire in the video??

I've got a 1200 that I've owned since the 1980's (had 2 at one point but sold one to a buddy). The ground wire in parallel with the signal cable has always bothered me from an aesthetic perspective. I noticed that the AC cable on the unit in the video had a 3-prong connector, so I'm wondering if you could connect the "Earth" point on the turntable to the Earth conductor in the AC cable and eliminate the single ground wire that parallels the signal cable.

Thanks for making this, I fitted a new cable this morning and it's all good. Ngl, was nervous, but followed to the letter, and did it. Really appreciated

Excellent vid mate

It's been said already but I have to thank you again. So clear and straight forward I feel confident I can do this myself. Love the camera stand you have made and then you test it with the chic edit. You are my favourite nerd, this video has brought joy to so many people. Thank you.

Do you have a website where I can contact you for Technics SL1210 repairs? Thanks

Nice one 👍🐱

Great this way looks really simple thank you for your time 🙏

Had one interesting case last year - one SL-1200mk2 had a ground loop even after adding a ground wire back. As it came and was gone every now and then, could not find a reason. Best guess would have probably been faulty wires within the tonearm .

could I ask you about the counterweight. Can this become defective? There are two-dials 1) the entire weight itself by turning from the back, you can twist it either closer or further from you and 2) the black numeric dial on the front part which you turn to adjust the tracking force weight. Okay, well, I balanced the tone arm and am now at the stage of setting the tracking force, which according to my cartridge specs requires 1.9. So I turn it to that, BUT the tonearm doesn't seems to want to go down? As if turning the front part of the weight didn't do anything or shift the weight at all. I removed the entire counterweight from the arm and examined it by turning the front dial only, and looking closely if that dial would move like on a threaded bolt. But it doesn't seem to move, It's like it just turns in one place. Is it suppose to do this? Please advise.

Great record. Chic - I Want Your Love sample. Nile Rodgers and Bernard Edwards laying the groove on thick. Do you know which remix that is?

Hi @DJ Legion, I've seen two other mods besides this. 1 was with the internal grounding tied to R- but also L- ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-0tR-BxwSVZk.html and 2 was with R-/L-/ and E ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-8VNh5ifwBNQ.html I've seen also PCB's that are grounded as shown here from R- or as in the first example. Not sure if those would be better or not.I guess just stick to the original with a separate ground.

great video thank you i will be doing this tomorrow

Thanks alot!

Nice lesson sir ! Thank you !

Top quality info, editing, and camera work! Well done.

Thanks for this fine and verye informative video. I´ve been having this problem for a while now and haven´t used my beloved 1210 cause i thought it might cost a fortune to fix it. But with this video i think and hope that i can have it up an playing again soon, even though i´m not electrician.

Nice vid. I'm searching for an imbalance issue with my 1200's. Just tried the antiskate test and it's barely doing anything. Don't know if that's likely to be the cause though.

Great video, thanks for sharing. Cleared up my doubts about internally grounding!

So I'm hoping someone on here can help me out! I have an older Panasonic record player/receiver that worked fine, I pulled the RCA speakers out and plugged new ones in while it was powered on (like an idiot) and it popped and no longer works. Does anyone know what I can do to fix it?

Thanks, we have a 1200 ltd gold that may need rewire so happy to now do this ourselves. Can you name some of the tools, identified Stanley table clamp what about the auto wire cutters that looks like a fatmax but could be something else. etc.

WE DONT USED THAT GROUND CABLE ANYMORE. WE DO INGROUND INSTEAD. NICE VISUAL EFFECT ON THE PROCEDURE.

Thank you for this video, from beginning to end (about anti skip, to ground and good wires) I haven't tried it yet. Will soon though. Thanks

Hello mate, I was wondering if you could change the cables on my 1210s. I'm based in London

great video!

2:22 - the whole weight of the turntable is put on the tonearm :///

Hi I’m curious to know , when rca plugs go bad is it necessary to change the rca wire along with the rca plugs or can you cut the old rca plugs and solder better quality rca plugs and not replace the old rca cable ?

Fair play... I've only been dealing with a dodgy lead for about 16 years. Replaced today

You should have taken a weight off before you move it about, Anybody transporting your turntable you have to take the weight off the back and maybe the platter if it's a heavyweight platter, Your cause damage to the arm bearings.

Great video!

That was great. I enjoy your explanations, they are clear and concise enough for me to believe I can make these repairs myself. Ok, Monkey see, Monkey do. But I can’t gain your knowledge of electronics without some college learning though? So I won’t delude myself, and I’ll just watch and enjoy. Thank you.

What a wonderful and helpful video. So it looks like you highly recommend not doing a mod that integrates the ground into the RCA cables.

So... the two outer lines, next to the left and right channels, are the cable's shielding? Are there cables with seperated shielding and and extra ground wire inside? Thanks for the video. Cheers!

Chic - I Want Your Love [Todd Terje Edit], what an amazing track

Great vid, very well explained and described, have to replace the RCA and ground wire and feel much more confident after watching this, thanks dude..!

I am not deep into electrical stuff but I did the opposite operation and it solves my noise problem. So, yeah, thanks a lot! :-)

shame they didn't fit RCA sockets , then you could detach the cables and use what ever you like

if you ever replace a CDJ 100s Lens please make a video there is none on the internet! Love your technics repair videos man!