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Headshell leads and Arche headshell

I just received my Arche headshell. Definitely the best looking headshell that I have ever seen. I have been trying a couple of headshells, Phasetech and Ikeda with my Air Tight and FR64s and I did not like the result all that much in comparison to Reed. However, today, Air Tight with Arche headshell and FR66s sounds very very promising.
However, one problem that I have is headshell leads.
I have Oyaide, Ortofon and Ikeda silver leads that are all quite thick and stiff. I think the lead pins on Arche headshell may be a bit thicker than usual and it was really difficult to insert the headshell leads properly and I broke a few leads in the process :( Took me about an hour to finally fit all 4 leads then I found a new problem. The thick silver leads put enough force on the cartridge and kept pushing down the mounting plate essentially affecting SRA angle. As I understand it, the screw on Arche headshell can push down mounting plate for more SRA but there is no mechanism to fasten the mounting plate tightly against the headshell.
Finally I gave up on using those thick silver leads and just using Sumiko coppper leads for now which is so light and flexible that it virtually exerts no pressure to the mounting plate. Now the Air Tight/Arche/FR66s sounds great but I am wondering if there is any good silver leads that are flexible that would not cause any problem with Arche headshell?
suteetat
milimetr
141 posts
 
Thank you a lot for your description.
Does it mean that Arche cannot be used with Koetsu cart?
I was thinking about pairing Arche with Koetsu...
suteetat OP
435 posts
 
There should not be any problem with Koetsu cartridge unless you use one of those very stiff headshell leads, I would think.I find Oyaide/Ortofon leads too stiff for Koetsu and Arche for sure. Acrolink or simillarly soft leads that would not cause much tension when bent should work.
Right now I have Arche with my Air Tight cartridge.
I should be getting the 2nd Arche sometimes next month with
silver litz wire and hopefully that will be soft enough.
Not sure why many silver leads are quite stiff. They are flexible and not very pliant. Silver valhalla wire in VPI arm or silver Finewire in Reed arm would also be ideal.
Also, because of the long body, SRA adjustment with Arche will not be all that useful but you can always keep the mounting plate parallel to the headshell and use the arm's SRA/VTA adjustment instead.
milimetr
141 posts
 
Thanks a lot. I am considering to use Arche with Virtu tonearm and Koetsu Coralstone, so your opinion is very useful for me.
nandric's avatar
nandric
4,086 posts
 
Suteetat&Milimetr, For the 'low riders' among carts there are thicker inserts. I bought two standard and one 'fat' insert for just one of my carts with unusual 'height dimension'. The reason is the sturdy construction of the HS back side with arm coupling and azimuth provision.
dover
2,285 posts
 
06-18-13: Suteetat
On Koetsu cartridge with long body, if you tilt the mounting plate just a little bit, bottom end of the cartridge body would hit the LP quite easily.
If you feel the cartridge needs to be so far down at the back to get the VTA right that it touches the record, there must be something horrendously wrong with your system, or the diamond has been mounted incorrectly. To get the bottom of the Koetsu to touch a record with a normal fixed headshell you would have to drop the back of the arm below level by an inch or so.

With the Arche, because the adjustment is close to the stylus, very small changes are the equivalent of very big changes back at the arm pillar.
You need to adjust the Arche by very very very very very very very very very very very very very small increments in your language.
This is the flaw in the concept of the Arche - very small changes result in large changes in VTA compared to adjusting the VTA back at the pillar.

For example if we assume the pivot to stylus is 250mm(10"), then to get a 1 degree change in VTA would require roughly a 4.36mm drop of the arm pillar.

If we assume the Arche adjustment screw is only 12.5mm(1/2") back from the stylus, then to get a 1 degree drop in VTA would require an adjustment of roughly 0.2mm at this point compared to the 4.36mm if adjusted at the pillar.
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