A direct-drive turntable is one of the three main

phonograph A phonograph, later called a gramophone, and since the 1940s a record player, or more recently a turntable, is a device for the mechanical and analogue reproduction of sound. The sound vibration Waveform, waveforms are recorded as correspond ...

designs currently being produced. The other styles are the belt-drive turntable and the idler-wheel type. Each name is based upon the type of coupling used between the platter of the turntable and the motor. Direct-drive turntables are currently the most popular phonographs, due to their widespread use for

turntablism Turntablism is the art of manipulating sounds and creating new music, sound effects, mixes and other creative sounds and beats, typically by using two or more Phonograph, turntables and a cross fader-equipped DJ mixer. The mixer is plugged into ...

in DJ culture.

Panasonic is a Japanese multinational electronics manufacturer, headquartered in Kadoma, Osaka, Kadoma, Japan. It was founded in 1918 as in Fukushima-ku, Osaka, Fukushima by Kōnosuke Matsushita. The company was incorporated in 1935 and renamed and c ...

's Technics series were the first direct-drive turntables, and remain the most popular series of turntables.

Design

In a direct-drive turntable the motor is located directly under the center of the platter and is connected to the platter directly. It is a significant advancement over older belt-drive turntables for

, since they have a slower start-up time and torque, and are prone to wear-and-tear and breakage, as the belt would break from backspinning or scratching. A direct-drive turntable eliminates belts, and instead employs a motor to directly drive a platter on which a vinyl record rests. This makes scratching possible, as the motor would continue to spin at the correct RPM even if the DJ wiggles the record back and forth on the platter. On the other hand, direct-drive turntables may suffer from vibration due to the motor, which is less of an issue for belt-drive turntables. However, in recent years, shock-absorbing (less dense) material, placed between the motor and platter, has been used to cut back on vibrations. The

torque In physics and mechanics, torque is the rotational analogue of linear force. It is also referred to as the moment of force (also abbreviated to moment). The symbol for torque is typically \boldsymbol\tau, the lowercase Greek letter ''tau''. Wh ...

on direct-drive turntables is usually much higher than on belt drive models. This means the platter speed is less susceptible to outside forces (

stylus A stylus is a writing utensil or tool for scribing or marking into softer materials. Different styluses were used to write in cuneiform by pressing into wet clay, and to scribe or carve into a wax tablet. Very hard styluses are also used to En ...

, hand). Higher torque also means the platter will accelerate to its proper speed faster so less distortion is heard when the record begins to play. Some direct-drive turntables further reduce the separation of motor and platter by using the platter itself as the rotor in the turntable's

synchronous motor A synchronous electric motor is an AC electric motor in which, at steady state, the rotation of the shaft is synchronized with the frequency of the supply current; the rotation period is exactly equal to an integer number of AC cycles. Sync ...

. This means that there is no motor, per se, in the turntable - the platter is entirely driven by the magnetic field induced by the turntable's stator. In all turntables a motor spins a metal disk at a constant speed. On top of the rotating disk ( platter) is a mat and on top of the mat records are placed to be played. Traditionally rubber mats were used to hold the record in place so that it would not rotate independently of the platter. To allow for easy scratching and more tricks DJs use slipmats to reduce the friction between the spinning platter and record. The slipmat is often made of a felt-like material. This way a DJ can scratch the record while the platter continues to spin underneath. In direct-drive turntables, the slipmat also helps isolate the record from motor vibrations that would be picked up by the stylus. Turntables for DJ use also include a pitch control, for fine tuning to the correct speed, used in conjunction with a strobe light, plus it also allows a DJ to mix using a technique known as

beatmatching Beatmatching or pitch cue is a DJ technique of pitch shifting or time stretching an upcoming track to match its tempo to that of the currently playing track, and to adjust them such that the beats (and, usually, the bars) are synchronized� ...

. From the late 1990s onwards manufacturers such as Vestax started to include other electronic controls such as reverse, and "nudge". DJs and turntablists use all the above functions to assist them in musical performances.

History

The first direct-drive turntable was invented by Shuichi Obata, an engineer at Matsushita (now

), based in

Osaka is a Cities designated by government ordinance of Japan, designated city in the Kansai region of Honshu in Japan. It is the capital of and most populous city in Osaka Prefecture, and the List of cities in Japan, third-most populous city in J ...

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

. It eliminated belts, and instead employed a motor to directly drive a platter on which a vinyl record rests. In 1969, Matsushita released it as the SP-10, the first direct-drive turntable on the market, and the first in their influential Technics series of turntables. In 1971, Matsushita released the Technics SL-1100. Due to its strong motor, durability, and fidelity, it was adopted by early

hip hop Hip-hop or hip hop (originally disco rap) is a popular music genre that emerged in the early 1970s from the African-American community of New York City. The style is characterized by its synthesis of a wide range of musical techniques. Hip- ...

artists. A forefather of turntablism was DJ Kool Herc, an immigrant from

Jamaica Jamaica is an island country in the Caribbean Sea and the West Indies. At , it is the third-largest island—after Cuba and Hispaniola—of the Greater Antilles and the Caribbean. Jamaica lies about south of Cuba, west of Hispaniola (the is ...

New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...

. He introduced turntable techniques from Jamaican

dub music Dub is a musical style that grew out of reggae in the late 1960s and early 1970s. It is commonly considered a subgenre of reggae, though it has developed to extend beyond that style.Dub: soundscapes and shattered songs in Jamaican reggae, p.&nb ...

, while developing new techniques made possible by the direct-drive turntable technology of the Technics SL-1100, which he used for the first sound system he set up after emigrating to New York. The signature technique he developed was playing two copies of the same record on two turntables in alternation to extend the b-dancers' favorite section, switching back and forth between the two to loop the

breaks Break or Breaks or The Break may refer to: Time off from duties * Recess (break), time in which a group of people is temporarily dismissed from its duties * Break (work), time off during a shift/recess ** Coffee break, a short mid-morning rest ...

to a rhythmic beat. The most influential turntable was the Technics SL-1200, which was developed in 1971 by a team led by Shuichi Obata at Matsushita, which then released it onto the market in 1972. It was adopted by

DJs such as Grand Wizzard Theodore and Afrika Bambaataa in the 1970s. As they experimented with the SL-1200 decks, they developed scratching techniques when they found that the motor would continue to spin at the correct RPM even if the DJ wiggled the record back and forth on the platter. Since then, turntablism spread widely in hip hop culture, and the SL-1200 remained the most widely used turntable in DJ culture for the next several decades. Technics also introduced the first direct-drive tangential-arm turntable, the model SL-10, in 1981.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Direct-Drive Turntable Consumer electronics Japanese inventions Musical instruments invented in the 1960s Turntables