Not forgetting Mr Palmer himself for providing decades of TLC to his long-serving and no doubt lovely-sounding hi-fi system. So, it would seem that hearty congratulations are in order for both Thorens and SME, on the design and manufacture of some excellent components.

There are probably more classic turntables and arms than you might think still in use out there, but “one careful owner” examples may be few and far between. You certainly have my permission to share the photos and story. The replacement cartridge for interest was an Ortofon 2M Blue which works brilliantly. That worked! The SME did suffer from the dreaded droop and I had to replace the coupling rubbers about 15 years ago. With our custom stand off and strain relief system all mess & clutter on the bottom of the tonearm are eliminated. Our custom bottom end completely eliminates the original SME bottom end. Push the balsa wood damping with axial turns into the straight end of the tonearm wand. We actually use almost 10 feet / 3.04 Meters of 4 X 33 to accomplish a 4.25 feet/ 1.25 Meter run of cable. The kit upgrades the SME 3009 models up to the 3009 Improved to function as SME 3012 with the heavy arm wand and counterweight system of SME 3012. The guy who sold it to me from Unilet (after a long conversation on the suitability of the Thorens, Garrard 401 or Transcriptors for my requirement – needing to be transported to/from university with minimum fuss) advised me to always give the platter a little assistance to start and stop to minimise belt wear. Main counterweights either 220g or 160g and a end cap to fix the wayrod and to position the. The turntable belt I replaced was the original and giving no problems, but I thought I would treat it. The scrawl on the back of the invoice is, I think the dimensions for the plinth I made for it, on which it still sits. So I thought you might be interested to see the combination still in use and the original invoice pictures of which are attached. So I wondered if the original supplier still existed and there you were!! I was getting advice for a new cartridge for my beloved Thorens TD150/SME 3009 combination and ordering a replacement belt, and I mentioned I had probably got the original invoice.

Our email conversation, reproduced below, threw even more light on the subject:

Sme tonearm repair