Vintage Asylum

Classic gear from yesteryear; vintage audio standing the test of time.

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RE: BIC 960 Turntable

Posted by Richard Steinfeld on December 25, 2011 at 00:44:16:
I can't imagine how they managed to do this in the first place, but BIC's engineers specified precisely the wrong Anderol grease for these machines. Anderol said to avoid using it on these surfaces and mechanisms.

That's why the mechanisms seize up. If you follow the instructions in the repair manual, your turntable will fail.

You have to clean every bit of it off thoroughly: dismantle the whole machine. Isopropyl or methyl alcohol usually does the job. Silicon grease is excellent for the plastic-plastic and plastic-metal interfaces, but do not use it for metal-metal. Be very careful not to trash the teentsy rubber donut on the cam gear. Properly cleaned and lubed, these machines should run forever, but I sometimes have nagging thoughts about the motors. There's a fix for the BIC "sick motor syndrome," but I'm concerned about accumulated wear on the motor sleeve bearing (there's only one!).

These are no-way audiophile turntables, but I have to confess that I have a real soft spot for them. It's a unique sort of "chewing gum and rubber bands" American design. It's clever, and works better than it has any right to.