High Performance Low Mass Tone Arm Suggestions Needed


The turntable that is the repository for this arm is my SOTA Cosmos Eclipse, so that means we are talking 9 to 10.5 inch arms. The cartridge to be used is an Ortofon MC2000, it weighs 11 grams so a substantial counterweight is needed. 

 

Looking for my highest quality options to make this combo work. Absolutely love this cartridge, so it is to be my long term reference, which is why I am willing to invest the time and money to find the best pairing. 

neonknight

@neonknight  : I owned this Audio Technica tonearm and is with extremely high quality performsnce and came with 2 arm wands: the straigth by default and the other a S shaped removable headshel.

 

R.

Before I do anything I decided to see if my Dynavector arm could accommodate the second MC2000 I have that has been retipped. The OEM will play on the arm with a Supex SL2 headshell which is 7.2 grams. I just ordered a Denon PCL5 headshell which weighs 5.6 grams. Perhaps the reduction in mass is significant to work with the retipped MC2000. If not I have another candidate to put the OEM one onto. We will see how it works out. 

@neonknight , I own a Sota Cosmos Eclipse Vacuum. Many of the arms mentioned above will either not fit like the Trilanar or be a disaster like the Moerch. The Triplanar is a fabulous arm. The Moerch is....not good. The Arms that are best suited to the Cosmos by fit and operationally are the SME V, which is now available again, the 4 Point 9, the Origin Live arms and finally the Schroder CB. I chose the CB for several reasons. First and most important to you is that there are three different mass cartridge plates and different sized counterweights. You can adjust the EF of the arm to suite the cartridge. It has the best bearings of any arm I have ever used. It has a fabulous magnetic antiskating mechanism that also serves to dampen the arm. I use a WallySkater to adjust it and it's action is delightfully linear and predictable. It is a neutral balance arm like the TriPlanar which means VTF does not change with elevation. It uses one wire without any intervening contacts cartridge clips to RCAs or XLRs. The wire exits the bottom of the arm's mounting post under the turntable so it does not interfere with the dust cover and looks nice and neat. The only downside is that it does not come with a tonearm rest. Frank Schroder believes they resonate and interfere with the sonic clarity of his arm. With the Sota there is a very simple solution. You make one. If you look at my system page you can see the turntable with my locking tonearm rest attached to the top of the plinth. Trying to work on a cartridge with the tonearm floating about is asking for it. Should you decide to do a Schroder I would be happy to crank you out a rest if you are not up for it.

@neonknight seems like you have your tonearm sorted, but it might be if interest to know that Bernd @ Primary Control basically builds each arm to customer spec and may have a low mass option...