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In Reply to: Stanton 680 & 681 stylii fit Pickering XV-15 posted by Interstage Tranny on March 27, 2007 at 15:04:18:
Thanks!You're quite right about the wear vs tracking force and radius issue. Years ago I ran calcualtions on the Hertzian stresses in the vinyl and a 0.2 mil side radius at 1 gram has significantly higher stress than a 0.6 mil at 3 grams. I also ran a test comparison using three brand new copies of the same LP. One was kept as a reference, one was played at 1.5 grams with a Shure M91ED, and the other with a Stanton 500E at 3 grams. The played LP's were compared to the reference after 1, 5, 10, 15, 25, and 50 plays. I only played the inner bands, which took about 6 minutes. Even at 5 plays, the 500E was noticeably cleaner in the highs. After the 50 plays on each, they were rested overnight and again compared to the reference. The record played with the 500E was nearly as good as the reference, having recovered overnight. The one played with the M91ED was better, but never recovered nearly as much as the 500E, and there was noticeable permanent damage.
I know you wouldn't play an LP that way, time after time with no rest between plays, but it did confirm the substance of my calculations. It also shows the ability of vinyl to recover it's shape after plastic deformation, given sufficient time. provided, of course, it's not deformed too far.
To get the repeat play, I used a Dual 1229, with the changer spindle in place and a 45 RPM adapter on the top of the spindle. Since the "tree" type spindle couldn't drop the thick 45 adapter, it always sensed a record in place and would repeat play, thinking it was the next record. The size was set to 7", so only the inner groves were played.
Follow Ups:
Wow, that was quite an experiment ! Don't try that at home with cherished discs, friends. I can only imagine what the newer breed of micro line, fine line, hyper elliptical, Shibata, Van den Hul
et. al. would do to records with repeated playings.
Some spherical tipped cartridges are quite pleasantly surprising in their high frequency detail. I have an affinity for early 1960s stero cartridges by B&O, Elac, Empire, Fairchild, Ortofon, Pickering/Stanton & more; all with their, supposedly inferior, spherical tips. Sure, some of the later ellipticals are excellent as well, but not necessarily "better."
I recently became a "convert" to spherical when I started using a Denon DL-103. It's easily one of the best sounding and performing cartridges I've ever used
Aha, another spherical fan!I tried several over the years, but always had a fond spot for the Pickering XV-15/350 and the Stanton 681A. But I also liked the old Empire 888P, and the Shure M75B type II. I much preferred the M75B II to the M91ED.
The biggest problem with the line contact cartridges you mentioned (Shibata et al) is that the stylus has to be perfectly aligned in the roll axis. And even if it starts that way, if the anti-skate is off by even a small amount, the skating force tends to rotate the cantilever in its mount over a period of time.
I used to love that 681A myself, when I was constantly spinning 45s.
That Empire 888 is excellent, and currently very reasonably priced.
The later 888SE/TE ellipticals are outstanding all arounders. They are lightning fast, with huge soundstage effects.
The M91ED is even preferred by many, over the V15 III & IV. I like the M91E and M93E, as well, but Shures rarely have good imaging qualities, plus their bass is sometimes anemic, compared to the Pickerings and Empires and B&Os...
Fine Line tips can be great for very clean LPs. That seems to be their downfall, as very clean records get dirty as they spin. I always seem to prefer the normal ellipticals and sphericals. Your cause/effect re:antiskating is interesting. If you were a stereo buff in the '70s and '80s, do you remember all the tilted stylii that still sounded like okay stereo ? Fine Line tips might become a chisel if alignment is not close to perfect. Perfect alignment is tough to achieve in the real world, especially considering all the normally warped Lps we use. I guess that is why, in the real world, the elliptical and spherical have so many more devotees.
It is clearly another great example of how theory and reality differ. In theory, micro ridge and fine line should be better. But, in practice, in the real world, ellipticals can do a better job.
Again, practice modifies and even disproves the theory, while the theory simply guides us.
I am amazed at the newer tube eqpmt buyers, that believe new is better, in transformers and tubes, and cartridges ! There are still early stereo cartridges, that compete and win. Try an Elac 222, B&O SP 2-12, Fairchild SM-1 or SM-2, Pickering/Stanton 380, or Ortofon SPU spherical/SPE elliptical. Save your money for the real vintage stuff, and enjoy... while saving cash for the real tubes...
On Shures, I found they got a lot better with proper capacitive loading. I built a little in-line box with a switch to add capacitance. A lot of the later tables had low capacitance wiring because of CD-4requirements and they had too little for the Shures. That was true of Pickerings and Stantons, too; but they seemed less bothered. My favorite Shure was the M95HE. I know it was line contact, but it had the best sound to my ears.On one of our informal listening sessions, a bunch of us (9 or 10) were comparing cartridges. Greg, the local shop owner stopped in and brought an AKG P8ES. We all thought it sounded exactly like the Pickering XV-15/350 spherical and none of us could tell them apart, except Greg. He picked out the AKG every time.
I loved my old mono Fairchild with the rotating ferrite rod, but it wasn't good for stereo records as it had no vertical compliance. I liked the old Shure M3/N7D combo. The AT13Ea was their best, I thought.
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