Kiseki Blue.....

I own one which still works very well, and I track it at about 1.9 grams. A little less or a little more will depend on the cartridge's interaction with the tonearm. But this cartridge has worked well with every tonearm I've tried it on: very friendly, if very heavy.

Thanks for the info. Rummaging through my stuff I came across this cartridge which I'd put away many years ago. I don't really remember what I thought of it back then, but I guess it could be called decent now days. One thing for sure its not the world's best tracker.

rgds, david

Not the worlds' best tracker? I've always thought of this as the best tracker I've ever had, apart from a Shure V15, latest edition. It likes more mass, and works fine on Rega arms and on air-bearings. What arm are you using it in? I think of it as the Shure of MCs: unfailingly musical, good with rhythm, not bright, and good in the bass. It might need some breaking in, and a drop of Stylast run down the cantilever into the inner workings of the cartridge frees up the suspension (though I don't know what it does to the suspension in the long run) and improves the bass. If you want to sell it, let me know.

I'm using it with a Dynavector 505 arm. Like I mentioned in my original post, I just found this cartridge after many years so it might need to breaking in again. I'm going to reserve judgement for a couple of weeks and see how this one compares to your experience.

In general I don't like the idea of using chemical cleaners on any cartridge. Like you said we have no idea what the chemicals can do to a cartridge's suspension, at the very least it could gunk it up with dust.

Stylast is not a cleaner, but a protection agent, and it was used to free up suspensions by audio reviewers in the '80s all the time. I used it on my Kiseki 3 years ago and it peformed as advertised, restoring the bass and dynamics, and I haven't had a problem since. However, you are right that there is no way to know - short of sending it to Van den Hul - exactly what it is doing. If you get desperate and don't want to send it for a rebuild (it's not really a classic, though it is very well built, I've considered sending it for a boron cantilever/stylus rebuild), you have the option. The Dynavector is an exotic arm - I had a chance to buy one at a good price and passed on it, and I've been kicking myself ever since - and it is hard to know what is going on, as there's such little experience out there of this arm. I can say that it works very well on my Maplenoll, which has high lateral mass like your Dynavector. Twl on this website would probably know something. I hope it works out for you, it really does track better than most MCs, when set up optimally: I've never heard it mistracking, though I don't as a rule use test records, just "real" ones. Kiseki-san polished his diamonds with human hair as a final step.