Cartridges, tone arms, turntables & so on ...

Ned

Ned

Ikon Class
Joined
Apr 20, 2011
Location
Litchfield County
I've just upgraded to a new turntable - a SOTA Sapphire belt drive with a Sumiko MK 3 tonearm & a Micro Benz moving coil cartridge with a Parrasound transformer. It came as a package & I'm interested to hear if anyone here has experience with MC cartridges with mono 45s. The cartridge sounds fine except a "blurring" in the upper midrange. It is set up properly, balanced & tracking at the appropriate weight so I'm thinking the sound is with the cartridge or moving coils in general. This is the first moving coil I've owned.

I don't have the same proplems with my old standby ( a Pickering that is rugged, great sounding , high in output & tracks even difficult pressings) or my alternate - a Sumiko Pearl, I'm using a tubed phono section in a Conrad Johnson preamp with matched vintage Blackburn Mullards.

In short, does anyone have a similar problem with moving coils in this application & I am interested to hear what brand of cartridge you guys find to do a good job on your 45s.

Ned
 
Ned said:
In short, does anyone have a similar problem with moving coils in this application & I am interested to hear what brand of cartridge you guys find to do a good job on your 45s.

Ned
Click to expand...

I would also like recommendations as I need to upgrade. I´ve had MC Benz cartridges in the past and never had the problem you describe though.
 
Moving coil cartridges should not have noticeable blurring in any frequency range. There must be a problem somewhere. My guess is that it would be in the step-up transformer, or the connections into or out of that device. My advice woud be to replace the Benz/Parrasound with a higher output moving coil that does not require a step up transformer. There are many great ones available in all price ranges these days.
 
bosshoss said:
Moving coil cartridges should not have noticeable blurring in any frequency range. There must be a problem somewhere. My guess is that it would be in the step-up transformer, or the connections into or out of that device. My advice woud be to replace the Benz/Parrasound with a higher output moving coil that does not require a step up transformer. There are many great ones available in all price ranges these days.
Click to expand...

Mark -

I agree, I think the problem is in the low output level from the Micro Benz, maybe I'm driving the tubes at a higher level than I'm used to. I'm going back to try a higher output moving magnet & I bet the blurring will disappear.

I'm still interested to hear any recommendations on cartridges, especially those that track 45s properly

Ned
 
I have a Concept turntable. It's basically a slightly upgraded version of the Pro-ject Debut III, from what the salesman at the store told me. It came with an Audio-Technica cartridge mounted on it. It's ok, but I'll probably upgrade at least the cartridge sometime soon(ish). I'd like to get a mono cartridge for my 45's and mono LP's, but I don't want to lose the stereo option. My question to the people who have mono cartridges is whether they have them permanently mounted on a dedicated turntable, or if there is some easy way to swap your stereo and mono as the mood strikes? I've seen some tone-arms have a removable headshell, so I could see having two pre-mounted cartridges as being one option, but my tonearm is one piece.

Any suggestions?
 
The only truly satisfactory way to swap mono/stereo cartridges, is to have a turntable dedicated to each. Removable headshells are not a solution that I would personally ever use. The sacrifice in sound quality is more than I'm prepared to accept. No serious quality minded manufacturer woud produce such a device in the first place, and even if you could buy a good one, there are inherent problems. Extra unsoldered connections that will degrade the sound, mechanical connections that will resonate and feed back into the cartridge, etc. But if you don't really care about sound quality, a removable headshell offers unmatched convenience.
 
bosshoss said:
But if you don't really care about sound quality, a removable headshell offers unmatched convenience.
Click to expand...

Well, this is exactly the problem; I do care about the sound quality. I'm sure I'll be able to swing it someday, but not right now.

I've been thinking about the possibility of having a dedicated mono turntable ever since I got my Scott 222C integrated about 15 years ago. Never having had a vintage piece of equipment before, I was stoked that the input selector had options for "Turntable 1" and "Turntable 2". And a mono switch!
 
Excellent point! In fact, if I sell all my stereo records I'd surely have the cash to buy a killer mono set-up. I could even sell one speaker!

PS - I'm only half-joking.
 
Ryan L. said:
I could even sell one speaker!
Click to expand...
I visited Tim Warren in Morristown in 1985 and he had a turntable sitting on top of one giant speaker. I forget what it was but it looked like the sort of thing you'd play a guitar through on stage. Sounded great for garage punk records.
 
Ryan L. said:
I'd like to get a mono cartridge for my 45's and mono LP's, but I don't want to lose the stereo option. My question to the people who have mono cartridges is whether they have them permanently mounted on a dedicated turntable, or if there is some easy way to swap your stereo and mono as the mood strikes? I've seen some tone-arms have a removable headshell, so I could see having two pre-mounted cartridges as being one option, but my tonearm is one piece.

Any suggestions?
Click to expand...

There are some turntables that can be fitted with extra tonearm bases to hold up to 3 tonearms ( Micro Seiki ; Transrotor etc )
 
Michael W said:
I visited Tim Warren in Morristown in 1985 and he had a turntable sitting on top of one giant speaker. I forget what it was but it looked like the sort of thing you'd play a guitar through on stage. Sounded great for garage punk records.
Click to expand...

That's hilarious.

Hey bosshoss, what were you saying about unwanted resonances?
 
IMG_0941.JPG
bosshoss said:
The only truly satisfactory way to swap mono/stereo cartridges, is to have a turntable dedicated to each. Removable headshells are not a solution that I would personally ever use. The sacrifice in sound quality is more than I'm prepared to accept. No serious quality minded manufacturer woud produce such a device in the first place, and even if you could buy a good one, there are inherent problems. Extra unsoldered connections that will degrade the sound, mechanical connections that will resonate and feed back into the cartridge, etc. But if you don't really care about sound quality, a removable headshell offers unmatched convenience.
Click to expand...

The Graham Phantom tonearm B-44 allows for tonearm swaps.

Yes lads, it can be done...

Though, as has been observed, perfection may serve as the enemy of the good.

To each there own.
 
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