Re-tipped phono cartridges

I noticed a lot of ads for re-tipped phono cartridges are suggesting this is an improvement over the original. I respectfully disagree. Regardless of the new stylus the integrity of the original design has been compromised.

Absolutely, this is what i’ve been posting here for a long time. And every cartridge manufacturer will tell us the same, J.Carr explained it on this forum. It is always a compromise, especially when the cantilever is replaced.

There are plenty of amazing original cartridges on the market, especially the vintage cartridges, sometimes the price for a whole new cartridge (even with Diamond cantilever) is very close to the service price charged by retipper for a new cantilever/stylus. I’ve bought a few NOS (never used) Dynavector cartridges with Ruby and Diamond cantilever for less than retippers service price. When the actual NOS cartrisge with the most expensive diamond cantilever cost less than sevice price it means something.

People upgrading some inferior cartridges with better cantilevers and better diamonds and i can understand it, but still i would rather buy a better cartridge from the start. I can also understand if someone tried so many cartridges and there is an absolute favorite discontinued model, original designed is retired and you can only fix it with someone else.

Many cantilevers were made exclussively for specific cartridge manufacturer, not available today for anybody else. beryllium cantilever for example. Hollow Pipe Boron cantilever for example. Short gemstone cantilevers. They are NOT available for ANY retipper. Replacing those with something else is a compromise, not the best solution. Also they know nothing about calculation made by the original designed (before he decided to use one or another cantilever/stylus etc). An original designer can make 20-50 samples of the cartridge prototype using different materials before he will chose one. Each state of the art cartridge is voiced by the original designer. 

My analogy is not a cars, but a plastic surgery. Some people don't mind to add a bit of silicone to some parts of their body, or change the shape of the nose for example. They think it's better.  

Well, if someone is sending a cartridge for retipping, it's usually because it's sounding pretty ratty.  So it makes sense that the one that comes back is an improvement over what they remember.  But the deterioration of a phono cartridge is so gradual, I'm not sure anyone could accurately remember the sound of the original. BTW, I had Soundsmith retip a Transfiguration cartridge for me and it sounded great, so I wouldn't hesitate.  It only cost $500 as opposed to a new one for a couple grand, so there's that as well. 

We have seen different assumptions about durability of styli.
From, say, 500 till 2000 hours. Whatever the case at some point
in time the stylus will wear out. There are then two alternatives.
Exchange for the new cart by the manufacturer which offer this
possibility or ''retip'' in two variations; either stylus only or stylus
and cantilever combo retip. The later is more expensive but the
first more difficult to do. So, obviously, the retipper will prefer
the combo. By MC kinds this consist in gluing new cantilever/
stylus combo in the so called ''joint pipe''. This is usually aluminum 
pipe on which the coils and tension wire are fastened and in which 
the cantilever is glued. By MM kinds the new cantilever is glued 
 on the restant of the old cantilever. 

Accodrinf to the Technics research published here the type of the cantilever and the whole moving mass is very important.

Technics engineers explained it very well:

"Somewhere in the high frequencies, every cartridge has an undesirable resonance point. Undesirable because there the frequency response curve climbs a sudden peak. If that peak is in the audible range, your records sound not as intended. That resonance frequency is determined by the total effective moving mass of the vibrating system - the summed masses of the diamond stylus and, most importantly, the cantilever and magnet, etc. To shift that harmful resonance frequency up into the high supersonics, the effective moving mass must be reduced to the lowest possible minimum. Also, too much effective moving mass increases the mechanical impedance, thereby negatively affecting the cartridge’s tracing ability."

As you can see on this image they are comparing Hollow Pipe Boron to a pure Diamond rod cantilevers. The high frequency peak is different.

I have a better example of the same technology on high resolution image of my Grace LEVEL II with hollow pipe boron cantilever and MicroRidge stylus.

The difference of this technology is obvious, can you see any glue around the stylus tip on my images ? It’s nothing but a grown crystals of Pure Boron into a pipe configuration. A tip mounting hole made using a laser beam. This is all about low moving mass and superb rigidity.

Unfortunately none of the retipper can offer Hollow Boron Pipe cantilever these days. They can’t mount the stylus using laser drilling techniques, instead they are using a huge amount of glue just like this (on boron rod) or like this (on ruby rod).

When you retipper is not qualified you can get something like this (horrible job, will you accept it even if it's cheap?). In comparison just look at the original from the manufacturer.

Dear chakster, I don't know when my Klyne 7PX 3.5 is produced
(80is?) but there are ''filters'' included for different hf frequency 
resonances. From 20 Khz till 35 Khz. There are also recommendation for about 30 wel known MC carts. The ''system'' is called ''high frequency contour''. So the phenomenon you mentioned was well known back then already.