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My battle with sibilance.

At the minimum sibilance is annoying to me. Its only present on a small percentage of my records. However today I wanted to see if I could improve it. The song in question is Men at Work's "Down Under". The cartridge is an Ortofon Cadenza Bronze retipped by Soundsmith. I went through a lot of the protocols for abating annoying sibilance.
1.My anti skate was not optimally set so I thought and I adjusted to less using a dead spot on a test record. I know some people don't agree with this. I tried Soundsmiths method but until I see a video I won't understand it.
2. I adjusted my VTA to at least 20 degrees. I realized it was off. It was set at 12-15 degrees. I know the Shibata stylus is sensitive to VTA.
3. I checked the VTF and it was set at the manufacturers suggestion at 2.5 grams. Which is dead in the middle of 2.3 to 2.7. I adjusted to 2.62. A lot of people think the higher range is optimum.
3. I made sure my stylus was absolutely clean.
Guess what? After all this, the sibilance was less but still there. As a check I listened to the song in streaming and it was in the recording!!! However not as bad as my record before my TT adjustments. So I'm happy now my TT might sound better on other recordings. Anyway I hope my fellow members here have had some success on sibilance and maybe some will benefit from what I did.

128x128blueranger

Showing 2 responses by pedroeb

pedroeb
493 posts
 
This is probably totally off field. Although it could be similar.

In my case I found that a combination of certain close frequencies and intensities interacted to create a tinny sound. To give you an idea of the range, Kiki Dee in particular sounded dreadful.

Two solutions combined to fix the issue.

Firstly I worked on my speakers. Upgrading crossover components plus treating the internals to reduce reflections and adding sound absorption filling so contamination on the rearward movement of the cones was as reduce as far as possible. After all, inward movement of the cone is 50% of the sound.

Secondly I added Supertweeters.

pedroeb
493 posts
 
I found a fix that has massively improved the clarity of my hearing, be it live or recorded.

The hairs in the outer canals of my ears were the culprits as they are long, thick and rigid. Normally hairs are unlikely to have any impact when they are short, thin, soft and flexible. In my case they were having a negative impact on what I was hearing. Probably it can be likened to having sound bounce though many layers of hair combs.

I should mention I have no idea if I am the odd one out or in the minority as I don't go around looking into people's ears!

The solution is to keep them short so there is a clear pathway to my eardrum.

They weren't so long as to be protruding from my ears, so it doesn't have anything to do with vanity.

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