Eminent Technology ET-2 Tonearm Owners

bdp24 - Harvey lead me through how to create a tank circuit to combat the electrical resonance inherent in Decca’s, which surprisingly affect tracking.

Eric, Can you please provide more detail on how you created this tank circuit?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LC_circuit

I am sure other Decca cart owners (potential and existing) on this thread would appreciate the info as well.  

I am of the belief that good phono preamps have the electronic circuit design qualities, to deal with electronic resonance. But I never owned a London or Decca. In my "Panic Room" , my preamp that I use has a hot rod mode - One flip of the switch bypasses all circuits except what is needed to create the simple signal. I run MC's at 47k, the noise floor is very low, and I use unshielded single shot wiring direct to the preamp.

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Ah Chris, it is an RM-9 you have, not a 10. I guess I forgot

I own both Eric. See my virtual system - click on the avatar.

A few years ago my RM9 was totally rebuilt by a local person and was well - let's say it was turbocharged. It was built up a little.
RM9's can be used with the Quads as long as one has self control. Obviously an over kill situation. But it provided me at the time with a glimpse of the "tone" I wanted with the Quads, and that led me eventually to the RM10 years ago as well.

My Achilles Heel is speakers. Like Boats have not met one I didn't like and could not make work. I don't mess around with amplifiers. and I don't get emotional about them. They are Slaves for the speakers. They better work. I don't tolerate downtime, and IMO amps are the most likely component to fail in the chain. My RM9 bettered 200 wpc OTL monoblocks in a shootout some years ago. As you know RM9's became too expensive (for whatever reason) for Roger to continue to make. I believe they were a special order item only. How the RM9 compares with Dan's Krell 600 that is own is very interesting.

@bdp24 

Eric not sure if you saw the question above. 

Can you please provide more detail on how you created this tank circuit?

I have had a couple emails asking about this circuit. If you have any information on this, pls post. Thanks Chris   

Hope this post finds everyone well.

Stay Safe, Social Distance, Stay Well .  

Best wishes - & hopefully less long states of mental hibernation or coronation...
I wanted to bring to your attention this jewel of a technical discussion from Pierre Lurné:
https://www.tnt-audio.com/sorgenti/lurne_air_bearing_e.html
now, well... :-)
- even a french emperor walking the naked truth may be clothed by invisible (very, very) small pieces of textiles covering some sensible parts of the body (impeding some directions of clear vision).
Even if he's called Prince Pierre Lurné who built one or two of the most beautifullly and perfectely crafted one point tonearms. (Which sound excellent too.)
- split horizontal and vertical resonances are rather an advantage than a drawback. (I've not seen or read ever convincing proof of the opposite, and Moerch is following this path with his top arm).
- therefore some of the cartridges with remarkably good bass do feature distinctively different compliances in both planes leading to the same split resonances with conventional tonearms. (eg. Decca, all true mono cartridges like Myajima).
- Listening, measuring and comparing the vibrations on the headshell of the ET2 vs. the vibrations on the outer bearing housing with a measuring coupler showed a remarkably similar frequency response at least up into the upper midrange.
Ie. the air bearing seems to be pretty stiff & well coupling to audible frequencies. The ultrasonic spectrum hitting conventional roller bearings, seems to me rather a multitude of metal to metal resonances of scattered and reflected energy back into the arm modulated by slightly elastic and moving point contacts. Ie. a process prone to  a certain alu-foil on comb quality, a form of distortion.
So I think the air bearing grounds vibrations rather well - and without introducing variable noises (except those inherent to the air film itself, which are like a very low level stable white noise).

Hi all,

I thought I would post and say hello.

Sota Saphire (non vacuum); original owner when I purchased in 1985.
ET2 with the carbon fiber wand
Shelter 901 mark 3.

I put my pump and air tank (2 liter bottle) in the garage wall.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/WbKvb5MEAq9hGfAq8


After using the Sota for 35 years, I turned in my Sota to Donna and had her team completely restore/upgrade (Dec 2020) my Sota (mag lev bearing, Eclipse controller / motor, chassis, platter upgrades). I noticed a material difference in the noise floor drop immediately.

Picture of our music room:

https://photos.app.goo.gl/Cr4AW1VgXBQatBE38

I have never had an operational problem with the ET2; it was setup very well when Sota/ET2 were the hot ticket back in the mid 80’s.

-stu

I'm the proud new owner of an ET-2.0 attached to a SOTA Star Sapphire and looking for cartridge advice.  Tonearm has the original aluminum wand  single leaf spring on the I-Beam.

I've seen the yellow sticky, but I'm still learning about the concept of cartridge compliance.

It came with a Shure M97xE with who knows how many hours on it and sounds "fine".  I put my newer Nagaoka MP-110 on and that was a noticeable step up.  I'm shopping around for $200-400 cart and wondering what would take it to the next level (and pair well with this tonearm).  Anybody have experiences with these on the ET-2:

AT VM-540ML
AT VM-740ML
Nagaoka MP-150
Grado Opus3
Denon 103R
Hana E
or any other suggestions in that price range?