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  3. 146410-2199

Woot! Decca cartridge bargain

Picked up a Decca Grey Export with a Garrott sticker on it and a metal clamp mounting bracket. It was sold untested for $270. As luck would have it, the thing works perfectly and sounds pretty darn good on a Jelco 750L with brass counterweight tracking at 1.75g on a Garrard 401.

Compared to my Paratrace Super Gold, the Grey is slightly darker with less detail but most notable is the reduced dynamic range. The Gold soaring while the Grey is more restrained. Nevertheless, the Grey is very musical with clean bass and clear metallic cymbal brushwork. Glad I snapped it up.

Anyone know what the Garrott improvements were on a Grey?

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Showing 6 responses by noromance

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noromance OP
9,404 posts
 
Hi Nandric. Yeah... My naming nomenclature was confusing. it’s a Decca Super Gold with a Paratrace stylus fitted by John Wright. I believe the Paratrace is fitted to the London Reference. It’s a major improvement to the original VdH that was on it.
noromance's avatar
noromance OP
9,404 posts
 
So I lowered the back of the 12" arm about 6mm in 1mm steps and the sound snapped into focus improving the aforementioned dynamics by an order of magnitude. This thing is growing on me.
noromance's avatar
noromance OP
9,404 posts
 
I sent it to John Wright in the UK for a check-up a few months ago. He said it was unused. So an almost NOS Garrott Export with a line contact stylus. Sweet.
noromance's avatar
noromance OP
9,404 posts
 
@topoxforddoc  Thanks for the Iink. I met KK around 1987 at a show in London. We "argued" as to why he seemed to prefer bassy sound with dull treble compared to my preference for clean, clear, teansparent, and detailed sound. I wasn't impressed.
noromance's avatar
noromance OP
9,404 posts
 
@topoxforddoc To clarify. The Grey may have the WP stylus. JW just said it was a type of line contact.
The Paratrace is on my SG/Decapod.
I also picked up a JW refurbished Garrott Bros Gold Microscanner which is superb. Almost as good as the SG sound but with no vinyl noise and a slightly more nuetral flavor.
noromance's avatar
noromance OP
9,404 posts
 
Thanks for sharing. A nice slice of history. I have some pics in Systems on my profile.
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