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Tonearm Advice/Help needed! HW19 Mk3 Turntable

So I just purchased a nice used VPI HW19 Mk3 turntable. It was sold with a Well Tempered Tonearm as an extra with the knowledge that the wiring might not work on the WT Tonearm. I setup the table and installed the Tonearm, poured the silicon fluid in and all that.

The Tonearm came wired with XLR terminations and a funky DIY homebrew ground system that looked like it was missing connections. First I used some XLR to RCA adapters that were around. These caused lots of feedback in my system. I tried the XLR adapter without the turntable connected and it seemed to cause feedback in the phono pre amp.

I tried to remove one of the XLR plugs and reterminate it with a cheap solderless RCA plug for testing purposes (before I purchased a soldering iron and fancy plugs...). Low feedback now, but also only the faintest of sounds from my stereo system.

The current armboard is drilled for the WT Tonearm. Possibly the armboard was originally drilled for a VPI tonearm, there are extra holes not used by the WTT.

I haven't gotten around to hooking up an old Turntable and testing my Phono pre, but it was working last time I used it...

The cartridge is just a cheap Ortofon Super OM10 with only a few months of use. It did suffer a fall or two setting up the WTT...

Do I have to solder the RCA plugs to get a good connection?
Do I need to rewire my tonearm? Is there likely sand or something else in the tonearm that would make it hard to pull cable through the tonearm?
I sent an email to Well Tempered Labs to see what they charge for upgrade or repair.

Should I just buy a new tonearm? If it would be a lot cheaper I would even consider cheap new Rega RB250 or 300?, I really don't want to spend a lot more on a tonearm right now....

Do I need to post pictures??

Thanks for Your Help in Advance!!



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Topic - Tonearm Advice/Help needed! HW19 Mk3 Turntable - MusicMtnMonkey 16:40:52 09/18/06 (1)


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