Thorens New Reference Turntable

DESCRIPTION

The Thorens New Reference is the result of Thorens' pursuit of perfect reproduction of recorded music. The recording information is included in the vinyl record. These are picked up by the pickup as the needle traces the smallest nuances of the grooves and converts these mechanical vibrations into electrical signals. These electrical signals are then converted into audible sound.

In the same way, however, all other mechanical vibrations of the record player are processed into sound signals, and as a result lead to distortions and other undesirable effects. The causes of these vibrations include, for example, building vibrations, impact noise, sound waves from the music being played and the self-generated vibrations of the record player. It is not possible to distinguish between the desired and undesirable vibrations. It is therefore of paramount importance to avoid these parasitic influences as much as possible.

The Thorens design team led by Helmut Thiele, who is responsible for the construction and design of the new Reference, has taken on this challenge.

UNIQUE COOPERATION

The Thorens New Reference is the first time a turntable has been designed and optimized from the ground up with a fully active vibration isolation system. The Thorens New Reference is the result of the in-depth cooperation between the companies Thorens and Seismion. Seismion has built an international reputation for its high-quality active vibration isolators used in the semiconductor industry, nanotechnology and scientific research laboratories, and is now applying this expertise to design a unique record player with active vibration isolation as an integral part of the system.

Active vibration isolation relies on ultra-high sensitivity piezoelectric accelerometers and fully linear electronic control to produce unprecedentedly smooth control forces without noise and distortion. This complex mechatronic system is based on the so-called sky-hook attenuation principle and isolates interference below 1 Hz. At 10 Hz, interference is reduced to less than 1% (-40 dB). Such performance is far superior to any other isolation principle (Figure 1). This illustration shows the comparison of the active isolation system - Sky Hook Damper - and a high performance air spring. Especially at the critical frequencies near resonance, the active isolation is a factor of 100 better than the air spring, and at 10 Hz it is still 17 times stronger. Other damping systems such as rubber elements have significantly lower performance and are therefore not included in this comparison.