I have seen some damping materials in MC designs turn to cracked stone in 2 years, ones I assume worked extremely well when new.
Many of us here collect vintage MC cartridges, turntables and tonearms and rate them high even in comparison to the new ones. Suspension of some brand new cartridges sometimes fail quicker than old ones. One example of LOMC cartridges with suspension that never fails is FR-7fz designed by Ikeda-San. A low compliance heavy monster, but Air-Core Coil, we have huge fan club of this series on audiogon.
Others are 40 years old and work perfectly.
At least you said that, fair enough.
It is true, because there are great cartridges that passed the time test and works just fine. Those were made with the right combination of materials.
Some materials are no longer available like Beryllium cantilevers (here is a Gold-Plated Beryllium that was an ideal material according to the old AT engineer later replaced with Gold-Plated Boron on another version of AT-ML180) or Hollow Pipe Boron cantilevers with ultra low mass or like this Grace LEVEL II BR/MR with micro ridge stylus tip mounted without glue (a tip mounting hole made using a laser beam). or this short gemstone cantilever invented by Dr.Tominary of Dynavector. Or that strange gemstone cantilever/stylus made from one piece of diamond by Sony (model 88D). Way different technology that we do not see anymore in modern design.
Ikeda LOMC cantilever-less design or cantilever-less Decca MI or Victor Direct-Coupled MC recently improved and used by Audio-Technica ART-1000
when you reduce the moving mass dramatically as I have done and cannot be done in MC designs, damping becomes orders of magnitude easier and more efficient. A win-win.
So there is no telling - even if I DO tell you of some I love, how you will find good ones?
I will. I have museum of vintage cartridges on my records shelf. But this is not the advice for me to buy what you liked, it is something that inspired you with your huge experience in rebuilt. It’s about clever design. Something rare and interesting.
So forgive me my vagueness - I just don’t want to misdirect. What I CAN tell you is what a wonder it is to find a well designed MM, MI or MC that HAS been traveling at 3/4 the speed of light, and after rebuilding, it plays so well........
I’m curious, what is a well designed MM/MI or MC from the past (not new) in your opinion ? I’ve never sent any vintage cartridge for rebuilding yet, just because my favorite vintage MM, MI and MC are just fine, i use time machine to travel back in the 80’s to find them.