What is the best way of cleaning your whole tone arm and hight adjustment on a technics 1200 mk2 as just brought second hand one and works great but very dirty thanks dj fluant-c

I gather you don't know how to adjust the tonearm. First put the stylus pressure, and antiskating to zero. Balance the tonearm for a free floating position. Ortofon cartridges will list the stylus pressure, generally 1.5 grams. Dial in the correct pressure, and set the antiskating to the same as the stylus pressure. If you require more assistance, or would like to inquire about repairing your Technics, please visit my website at audioserviceclinic.com. You may contact me there. Thank you.

Hi, remove it and give the contacts a good clean. If that doesn't work it will need replacing. John

of course this is adjustable but needs a good hand for it and a service manual would be great...

The anti skate adjustment. And if you scratch @ all....move the weight all the way in and take off the little extra one that screws in on the back. Also a great tracking needle is a M44G.

Ensure that the turntable is sitting as flat as possible and does not allow any external vibration to penetrate.
Also try operating it without a record on it make sure that the plate is turning smoothly without interruption and also does not have any vibration.

Regarding the poor sound quality (and possibly the skipping):
check the needle condition, see if exchanging it with a needle (or the entire pickup head) from a working turntable does any good.

Check the pickup connection pins (contacts on the pickup head and on the end of the wires coming through the arm from the unit), see if there is any dirt or oxydation and clean the contacts if necessary, also check for any damage to the wires.

As for the skipping - a heavily worn needle may affect the sound quality and cause skipping as well - if cahnging the needle (or the pickup head) doesn't make a change, try to realign the weight on the tone arm so that the pickup head will become a bit heavier, this could help somewhat (before you actually try to realign the weight, try to put a small coin or a small weight of some kind on the pickup head while it is playing a record, if the skipping goes away, you need to realign the tone arm weight).

This could also be a problem with the tone arm lifting mechanism (may be obstructed by something or damaged so it won't let the tone arm sit properly onto the record and "grab" the groove).

I just mentioned a few things you might want to check, but don't take anything for granted, the problem may as well be elsewhere in the unit.

regards

Triarcuate

Your tonearm might be damaged.

- OPTiC

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there should be a metal bit in the middle of that switch housing, sorta like the spindle on the platter, it should have one flat edge just get some pliers and twist the metal bar in the middle clockwise, until you replace the switch that will be the only way to swtich it off and on.

ive done this before many times, and sometimes in clubs the decks are in bad shape, so i always bring pliers, just in case!

there may be a weight missing on the arm , look at the other one to see the parts on that arm and make sure they are exactly the same nothing missing , otherwise there may be something wrong with the armitures guide
try tape on a penny then put it on top of the arm and see if it still skips

electech

X1N may I suggest a few drops of mineral oil, the bottlels you find in the local grocer store. Once applied let soak for mabe 2 to 3 hours. Wipe or sponge away oxidation. The soaking may take longer. View the working one very closely to compare to the troubled one. The controls may accepte repositioning to the correct position now. If you got the guts study the assembley and make notes of you disassembley procedure, the problem may just need some realignment internally. I hope this helped.