Detachable Head shell or Not?
I am in the process to up my game with some phono system tweaking.
I read in these forums of many people here with multiple arms, multiple cartridges and even multiple turntables. I am guilty of this myself but moderately compared to so many phono hardware diehards here.
All the continued comments on Talea vs. Schroeder vs. Kuzma, Da Vinci, Tri-Planar, etc., etc, on these forums. And the flavor of the day cartridge. One easy way to manage the use of many cartridges, easily swapping between them, and getting down to one turntable would be to run with a tonearm that supports removable head shells or arm tubes. And yet this does not seem to be widely done here. Is everybody just too proud of all the pretty phono hardware to admire?
Many highly respected arms of the past, FR 64/66, Ikeda, and now Glanz, Kuzma 4-Point, the new Tru-Glider, all with removable heads. And the Graham and Da Vinci with removable arm tubes. These products have a huge fan base and yet there seems to be an equal number of those against any extra mechanical couplings and cable junction boxes, din connections, etc.
I can appreciate having two cartridges, one to bring out that addictive lush bloomy performance and another that shows off that clarity and detail “to die for”. Being able to easily swap between the two, with hopefully only a quick VTF/VTA change, would be mighty nice. If too painful a process, I can understand the need for two arms here; like the idea of going through many LPs in an evening and not being obsessed with tweaking the arm for each. I hope I never get obsessed to do get to that point. But for different days/nights, to listen to different kinds of music, it could be mighty nice to swap out one cartridge for another in different head shells without the added cluster and cost of oh please, not another tonearm!. Do a minute or two of tweaking, ONCE, for that listening session, and then enjoy. There is always the added risk during the uninstall / install process to damage that prized cartridge.
Is running with a tonearm that has a detachable head shell all that sinful / shameful in the audiophile world ……. or not? I’d like to hear from those who have achieved musical bliss with removable head shell arms and also from those that if asked to try such a product would likely say, “over my dead body”!
John
I do prefer headshell for ease of service instead of just bending underneath tonearm or hassle removing it in certain cases to properly mount cartridge. Besides, I have a super-luxury swapping headshells with different cartridges at any time I want. I'm Thorens lover and enthusiast so I have 4 Thorens headshells with different cartridges and 2 Thorens decks TD-125 and TD-160 as a back-up or secondary analogue turntable. Planning to sell little TD160 and get TD-124 for further Thorensation! |
Dear @jafox : " one to bring out that addictive lush bloomy performance and another that shows off that clarity and detail “to die for”. Being able to easily swap between the two, with hopefully only a quick VTF/VTA change, would be mighty nice. " Well, with all those tubes in your system certainly you are an " addict " to that lush/bloomy performance ( nothing wrong with that because is what fulfill your needs(priorities. ). Cartridges are designed to pick up the signal in the LP groove modulations with minimum added every kind of distortions and obviously inside its market price. A cartridge must be truer to the recording but unfortunatelly the cartridge quality level final performance levels depends of other links in the audio system and the tonearm is mainly the cartridge mate that at the end function as a " tone control ". Each cartridge performs/sounds different mounted in different tonearm and here is where the removable headshell tonearm designs have a true advantage because when you change/test a cartridge with different headshells you can be sure that you will listen a different " signature " in the reproduced sound even that you are using the same tonearm.
Now, if you find out a fixed tonearm design that mates really good with a cartridge that fulfill your targets then go for it. Yes, additional connectors and solder points certainly degrades the cartridge signal but the question could be: how much degradation and if that degradation levels really matters and impedes that we can achieve our targets? Same for IC cables that open a wider choices ofthis critical link because each IC cables has its each sounds " color ". In audio there is no perfect solutions, every alternative we can have as a choice has its specific trade-offs and it’s up to each one of us to make the better choice for our MUSIC/sound priorities/targets.
Regards and enjoy the MUSIC NOT DISTORTIONS, R. |
Dear @au_lait : There are several reasons why your 66 is totally wrong to listen MUSIC and two of those reasons are that's a 12" EL design with a extremely high inertia moment and both of these reasons goes against quality room/system performance levels. I don't care what you want to make with your 66 at the end is what you like even that you as other 66 owners are wrong with.
R. |
I was asking @lewm specifically because he has an SP10 with a high mass plinth and a steel FR arm, similar to my set-up. Not really interested in debating how "wrong" my tone-arm is at this stage! But I appreciate your opinion of course. |
