Nothing wrong with the arm on the GR. The Triplanar and the Reed both cost considerably more than the table so would be a big investment. I'd live with the arm for awhile until you get a better sense of its qualities.
Tonearm for Technics 1200GR
I’m looking for a medium mass arm to replace the stock arm. Whatever arm is suggested it should have an armboard that can be bought for it as well. I run a Soundsmith Carmen MkII.
Id like to keep the new arm under $1500.
I found a Jelco TK 850s, but it appears to be a high mass arm. I also found a Timestep T-609, but it appears to be a high mass arm as well.
Id like to keep the new arm under $1500.
I found a Jelco TK 850s, but it appears to be a high mass arm. I also found a Timestep T-609, but it appears to be a high mass arm as well.
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Thanks for everyone’s comments. I have decided to keep the tonearm. Currently I use an LP Zupreme head shell, a KAB fluid damper, and a Funk firm mat with a deer hide mat on top of that. My Phono cables are Purist Audio Design Venustas Praesto Revision and an old Audio Research PH3SE Phono pre. This all gets fed to my BAT VK3ix preamp and eventually makes its way to my Thiel CS2.4 speakers. It all sound really good for older gear but I guess I like fiddling with stuff and that’s why I was thinking about improving my tonearm. But I think my money will be better spent on the cart after reading your comments. I also thought about a copper mat to add mass but I’m not sure how much more weight the bearing can take. |
The bearing friction of the Technics is lower than 5mg where no one of the tonearms named here has. All Jelco have friction between 20 and 30 mg. and the manufacturer does not want or do not want to apply better bearings. It is not possible to use a Jelco on the GR, it means taking steps backwards not upgrading! |
It is a pity not to be able to know the mass of the arm to correctly interface the cartridge; are you able to know this? @best-groove Since it was top of the line SONY tonearm along with PUA-9, you can look at the Sony cartridges specs for compliance. The arm was optimal for them, but it is also flexible, because there is an optional subweight to mount lightweight or even superheavy cartridges. But again, since the XL-88 and XL-88D cartridges made for use with this arm, i want to remind that dynamic compliance of XL-88 and 88D is 20cu @ 100Hz, we have to convert it to 10Hz for correct measurements, the compliance will be 34cu ! This is relatively high compliance and for SONY PUA-7 it is fine. For lower compliance and heavier cartridges we can add sony subweight. We can also use different (heavy) headshell. I think the arm is perfect for wide range of cartridges from low to mid-high compliance. The arm is so precisely made and it's a pure pleasure to use compared to many arms i've tried. -------------------- More about Sony PUA-7 here: The tone arm was born from the experience of PS-X9 development under the thought of resonance free. Long span vertical bearings, precision radial bearings, etc. reduce fulcrum of fulcrum while maintaining high sensitivity. Unnecessary resonance is reduced by the shell plug of the chucking mechanism. Parallel wiring of litz wire reduces transmission failure due to inter-line capacitance fluctuation. The high rigidity aluminum alloy pipe is adopted, and the bending rigidity 8 times that of the conventional one is obtained. The inside four scan cellar by a special cam is carried. A carbon clad shell SH-165 is included. The output code comes with a litz wire using output plug with a gold-plated plug. -------------------- Universal tone arm SONY PUA-7 specs: Effective length: 235 mm Overhang: 14 mm Full length: 330 mm Height adjustment range: ± 3 mm Needle pressure adjustment range: 0 to 2.5 g Cartridge weight range used (including shell weight): *11.0 g to 19.5 g *19.0 g to 27.5 g (when using sub weight) Attached shell weight: 10.5 g (SH-165) |
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