Experience purchasing a used high-end cartridge

I have done this a number of times, and I have sold also.

Often I buy a cartridge with the intention of sending it out for service. For instance, I bought an Audio Tekne MC6310 last year at a very attractive price but I knew there were a number of hours on the diamond. I played some sacrificial vinyl with it, and checked how it tracked and sounded. If everything checks out then I listen to it for a bit to get to know its presentation. I use the sellers report of hours as a conservative benchmark, in this case 800 hours. I figure I got about 200 more hours before it goes to Expert Stylus or AllClear for service. I have the same story about an original Kiseki Blackheart, but hours are unknown just that the diamond has been inspected and a lot of hours are left. I bought a Transfigurtion Proteus from a dealer with a reported 600 hours. My most memorable purchase was an essentially new Ortofon Verismo (50 hours) where the seller pulled the diamond off the cantilever when dusting. Since the cantilever is diamond its very expensive, so hopefully only the cement bond failed. Off to Expert it went and it came back with a new diamond and a clean bill of health. So I got a $6K cartridge for under $2.5K. Finaly story is a purchase of an Ortofon MC2000 where All Clear put a new diamond in for me. The shanks of the new stones are larger than what the vintage stones were, so he carefully drilled the opening slightly larger and fitted the new stone in the factory mounting hole. Lovely job he did.

I keep a conservative tally of hours on my cartridges. If I sell one, I do report hours well. I also never sell a cartridge with any issues such as low suspension or skewed cantilever. Price is going to be higher than bargain basement but like I said I get mine serviced shortly after acquisition. Never had anyone complain about a purchase from me, and my feedback has numerous cartridge sales.

Buying a used moving coil is an exercise in risk management. Talk with the seller and get a history of the cartridge. Look at his/her feedback. Plan on the cartridge needing service and factor that into your long term cost for it. But in the end it is a bit of a gamble. You are buying a piece that is worth more than what you pay for it and you offset that value by knowing you do not get its full inventory of hours and you will have to invest in it for a new diamond and cleaning in the future.

I don’t do it. Too many vulnerabilities with cartridges. And while I have had many excellent retips done, the sound is never quite the same as original, IME. If you have the option of having a manufacturer do a rebuild of the purchase, which is essentially a new cartridge, with warranty, then maybe. But at that point the costs mount. I’d rather save up and buy new, if only to quiet the doubts in my mind. And I consider the cost and availability of manufacturer rebuild as a condition of purchase. It’s one reason I own no Zyx: rebuild costs are too high. Ortofons, though, are reasonable.

All that said, I did recently buy, at a steep discount, a demo MC Diamond that had been used at Axpona. But it came directly from Ortofon with full warranty and had less than 20 hours on it. I trust Louis at Ortofon USA, so I had no worries.

I don’t know how anyone else’s experience could bear on your decision, unless you unearth another person who bought an LOMC from the same source. If you’re really insecure, ask the seller if you can have the cartridge inspected by a trusted retipper, at your expense and in advance of any sale. If he doesn’t agree to that, you may have your answer. If he does, you’ll know exactly what you’re getting.