Origin live Aurora MKII, User Manual

Page 6

One click of the switch clockwise is 33.3 rpm - The 
second click clockwise is 45rpm

NOTES:  The speed should only be finally set with 
the pod in it’s FINAL position and at normal room 
temperature as speed varies slightly with belt tension 
and temperature.

 If you move the pod, you will need to re check the 
speed and  if necessary correct it, by repositioning the 
pod till the speed is correct. 

This is a quick operation, just 

leave the motor and platter spinning, as you slide the pod to 
adjust tension. Always set the speed with the cartridge dragging 
on a centre track of a record. The drag can affect speed setting 
to a small degree. Do not move the pod beyond the ideal 
distances mentioned in “fitting the belt”.

If you change transformer to the upgrade transformer may 
need to reset the speed.

If the speed drifts significantly then correct it using the speed 

adjuster screws. 

Instructions for reading the strobe

Place the strobe disc on the record to be played. Play the record 
and watch the relevant ring on the disc. Adjust the speed 
until marks on the ring appear stationary while the record is 
rotating. It sometimes helps to stare at infinity whilst doing 
this as the marks become easier to see. You can see the strobe 
effect in fluorescent light, although an ordinary bulb held 
about 2 feet from the strobe disc will also work fine. The bulb 
flickers at 50 Hz in the EEC and 60 Hz in  the USA.

You can purchase bayonet fitting fluorescent bulbs to fit 
normal lamps. Try to shut out daylight when carrying out 
speed setting.

Set the speed

Set the switch on the pod to the first click i.e. 33 rpm 
setting.

 Adjust the motor speed as follows:  using the small 

screwdriver, turn the speed adjuster screw shown in the photo 
for 33 rpm. This is accessible through the hole (furthest to 
the  right hand side) in the side of the pod and the slots in the 
screw heads are visible if you look into the holes (See diagram 
at start of this section). 

To increase speed, turn the screw clockwise until the speed 
changes. If the screw reaches the end of it’s travel you can 
usually hear a faint clicking. You will not damage the speed 
trimmer by over turning, as slippage occurs. The trimmer 
screw will not fall out. The trimmer screw is adjusted at factory 
so should only need fractional adjustment of less than a turn. 
However the capacity is 25 turns and in some cases more turns 
may be required to set the correct speed. 

Setting the 33.3rpm.

  When setting the speed, place the arm 

on the centre track of a record, so that the cartridge is tracking 
the grooves. This ensures that the drag of the cartridge is taken 
into account. Speed variations of up to plus or minus 1% are 
quite common on decks and the dc motor is capable of plus or 
minus 0.1% accuracy. Use the strobe disc provided to set the 
speed (full instructions are on the card). 

Click the rotary switch to the 2nd click clockwise and 

set 45rpm speed

  (or 78 rpm if you wish) using the same 

procedure as for 33rpm.

The dc motors can be slightly noisy initially and are never 
completely silent in comparison to a/c motors. This may be 
due to the precious metal brushes. However it is the much 
lower levels of vibration that is important not the audible noise 
and this is why they are great deal better in performance terms. 

Like most turntable manufacturers we recommend that you 
leave the turntable running between changing records as this 
reduces the belt wear that occurs with constant stopping and 
starting.

N O T E S   O N   M O T O R   &   S P E E D   S E T T I N G

-Do not use the power supply for anything other than the dc 
motor or the power supply is highly likely to be irreparably 
damaged and you could also damage the equipment you are 
plugging it into.

-The motor and main bearing will take at least 4 days to fully 
run in and sound it’s best. For this reason it is best to do a final 
speed check at the end of this period.

The speed stability of your deck will be excellent once 
everything has settled down in a listening session. 

When checking speed

 - Be aware that the speed is subject 

to temperature variation. This is due to oil thickening as the 
temperture drops. 1 degree centigrade drop in temperature 
results in a 0.1% drop in speed ( a 5 degree drop will be 0.5% 
slow).  0.5% speed drift is barely noticable to the average 
listner so this is not significant. Rega decks used to run 1% fast 
all the time to put things in perspective. 

The ear is less tolerant to music running slow than it is to 
fast. For this reason it is worth setting the deck to run very 
slightly fast at your average room temperature. Most houses 
are centraly heated and maintain the temperature such that 
significant variations simply do not occure.

Note that the main bearing and oil can take 2 hours to reach 
operating temperature if the deck is left in a cold room. The 
air in the room may warm up quickly but the metal in the 
turntable will take a lot longer. For this reason it is not worth 
constantly changing speed settings for absolute accuracy.

It is worth explaining that absolute speed accuracy is easy 
to achieve at the expense of sound quality. The ac motors, 
common to most decks are not prone to speed drift - however 
they do inject a great deal of vibration. This, sadly is never 
measured in technical reviews or people would be a lot wiser. 
The subjective effect of vibration is highly detrimental to 
sound quality when compared to fractional speed drift. For this 
reason we prefer to offer superior sound quality rather than the 
flawed illusion of technical perfection.

Further to this it is worth adding that we have experimented 
with the latest highly sophisticated dc speed controls (£1000 
plus trade cost) and found that although they hold speed with 
unerring accuracy, the sound and dynamics of the music are 
degraded to such a degree that a little speed drift is far more 
preferable.

F I N A L   S E T U P   O F   T O N E A R M

Refer to your tonearm  instructions. Use the following, only