Abstract: A pickup arm, pivotally mounted at one end within an arm housing, supports a stylus at its free end. The housing is subject to translatory motion between a rest position, clear of a disc record supporting turntable, and playback positions over the turntable. A brush is mounted in proximity to the turntable and beneath the path of travel of the housing, with the bristles of the brush extending from a holder in directions substantially parallel to the direction of housing travel. As the housing reaches an intermediate position in passage toward the rest position, the pickup arm is depressed to cause stylus engagement with the brush bristles, which clean debris from the stylus during completion of the passage. At the rest position, the stylus is supported by the brush bristles at an elevation substantially corresponding to the stylus elevation obtained during disc record engagement in the course of playback.

Abstract: In a system for playing back prerecorded signals from a centrally apertured and grooved disc record having an exposed conductive region surrounding the aperture susceptible of accumulating electrical charge of sufficient magnitude to damage a groove-engaging signal pickup for transducing the disc record, an apparatus for inhibiting a plurality of disc records from being disposed on the player turntable while grounding the conductive region of a disc record disposed on the turntable is provided. An engaging member is mounted to a centering spindle secured to the turntable for rotation in a first and a second direction in response, respectively, to the passage of a disc record to-and-from a playback position of the disc record on the turntable. If a disc record is disposed on the turntable, the conductive region of the disc record is located remote from the turntable.