Static and felt mats

[sombunya]

I was wondering if there's anything better than a felt mat to support a vinyl while it plays. Now, a company manufacturing $2000 TT's would probably be supplying it if there was, but then again, maybe not.

I have some thin (.030 inch) soft rubber sheeting used in the aircraft industry. I was thinking of cutting a piece to fit on the platter of my MMF 9.1. I would first try it on a junk LP by setting the record on a piece of it for about a week and seeing what happens. BTW, I never leave albums on the TT, ever.

Is there something better than felt for draining away static and resonances?

 

[Mosin]

I'm not a big fan of compliant mats because all of them that I have tried either dampen the sound too much, or they cause an ever so slight slip that negatively affects transients. My turntable comes with an integral non-compliant Acetal surface that interfaces with the record nicely. It has four narrow rubber strips that can be applied for that rare time that the user wants to play a 10" record. This is a compromise, but a small diameter record would be very difficult to remove from the platter otherwise.

I believe the entire conversation about mats says something about the state of turntable design because they are to correct flaws in the turntable, not the record. Before anyone takes offense, I do realize the extreme difficulties of designing a turntable that addresses these problems in a low cost unit. It isn't easy, but it seems to me that less expensive ones with platters of solid acrylic or other types of plastic tend to solve more problems than those at the same price point with cast platters and rubber or felt mats.

Caveat: Whenever I make such statements I always hear some turntable that defies logic the following week! Just when I was convinced that lightweight platters are inferior, I heard a Mitchell Cotter. That proved there is more than one way to skin the cat, so all bets are off. However, I will stick to what I said as general rule, but with exceptions noted.

 

[NorthStar]

I experimented with various materials as mats; different thickness and compressed cork that I cut myself.
Also different foams (very highly compressed and thin | highly rigid density). ...And of course all type of designed rubbers from various thinness. ...And some only less than a millimeter thick and with hole openings.
Yeah some felt one ones too (very very thin), that I installed under a rubber one or cork one.
Everything I did I made by hand (the outer and inner cutting); I just bought the materials in their raw form.

Never I could have tell which one sounded best, and I must have tried several dozens of them.
At the end I used a combination of two; the original rubber mat, with a very thin cork one under it that I made myself, couple millimeters thick. ...Also that rubber mat less than a millimeter thick with a cork one on top.

...More fun than truly science. ...But I did take it seriously while listening; only to let the music flow at the end without any damage to my brain and turntables.

 

[DonH50]

There was just recently a thread on static and solutions...