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New Zirconia Pipe Cantilever .. What's up with that ?

Reading Namiki website i discovered new type of cantilever available today:

Zirconia cantilever (Pipe) , well this is the only pipe cantilever (except for aluminum) available today to my knowledge, correct me if i’m wrong. This is something new.

"Because the material’s relative density is comparatively high at 6.0, we make full use of our technology to process it into a pipe shape. This cantilever plays a charming sound that is different from other materials."

Physical properties for currently available cantilevers described here.

**Any new cartridges with Zirconia Pipe cantilever available on the market ?

BTW: Browsing Namiki website, to my surprise, on top of the page i recognized that "unique cantilever" of my ex ZYX Premium 4D cartridge. In many of my posts i have mentioned this construction as something special, because the MR diamond is press-fit and the cantilever described by ZYX as Boron. Now i think that joint pipe for stylus tip (press-fit) was made of Zirconia and the rest is Boron Rod.

Since they are both hollow PIPES (black color) i assume they are Zirconia (no other black pipes from namiki).
This is what Nakatsuka-San using in Airy III and Premium 4D ZYX models (owned both models).




128x128chakster

Showing 2 responses by lewm

lewm
12,428 posts
 
mixupload, Broad generalizations such as the one you make are almost never bullet proof, and yours are riddled with holes.
lewm
12,428 posts
 
Chak, Just don't let your wife know that you are thinking about zirconium.  I haven't read this whole thread, but my hat is off to you for your interest in such arcane subjects.  If someone else hasn't mentioned it, I think in the old old days styli were often made of zirconium in lieu of diamond.  This goes back to the days of ceramic cartridges where the stylus was a separate entity, looked like a very short sewing needle with a fat end (and no hole for thread) where it fixed into the cartridge body, that could be removed from the cartridge body  and replaced by the end user when it wore out, which zirconium often did. This is how some of us in the modern era come to use the term "needle" when referring to an entire cartridge or to a stylus assembly.  Diamond styli were originally touted as a luxury feature of the best cartridges, and were really "needles".
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