Phantom + A90 question

Hi bill,
With unipivot bearings, they visually ride the groove different from gimble, quote on quote level heads shell with gimble type arms. You need a fozgometer to get it right with a graham, IMO. So even if the mate between cart and head shell isn't exact, you will correct that anomaly via Foz azimuth or o scops, graham head shells tilt inward by 2-3 degrees from vertical, ime

Hi Rockit,

I'm with you and use a Foz for azimuth, so I'm unconcerned about that aspect of any tilting. The nagging question for me is the solidity of the connection between cartridge and headshell. I'm getting the impression, since no one seems to have taken measures, that it's really not a problem. When my upgraded Supreme and rebuilt A90 arrive (tomorrow, fingers crossed), I'll try it both ways and report back.

Bill

I wondered about the same thing when I was using the A90 with the Phantom. In my setup two of the ridges are in contact with the Phantom headshell while the left rear ridge is completely outside the headshell area - see this pic.

The same situation existed with the Ortofon Jubilee in my setup.

In practice the A90 sounded great and I doubt contact with the third ridge would have altered the sound - at least with an arm having easy azimuth adjustment like the Phantom.

Nice pic, Tobes. I'll relax about mounting the A90. Seems like a non-issue. Thanks.

I doubt contact with the third ridge would have altered the sound - at least with an arm having easy azimuth adjustment like the Phantom.

With resolving components like this, changes in cartridge/headshell contact always alter the sound - even when azimuth remains constant.

Don't take my word for it. Try changing your mounting screws from stainless steel to brass to nylon - without altering azimuth or any other parameter. I guarantee you'll hear differences.

Think about how a phono cartridge works: anything that vibrates the coils or magnets generates a signal (or alters a signal being generated by other vibrations, such as those induced by record groove modulations). Stray vibrational energies within the cartridge body feed back into the armature and magnets, distorting their movements and therefore distorting the original signal. So, changing the behavior of these energies will alter the sound of the system.

The behavior of stray cartridge-body vibrations is heavily influenced by cartridge/headshell contact, as the screw material experiment mentioned above easily demonstrates. Altering the number, size or placement of cartridge/headhsell contact patches also alters those behaviors. Ortofon chose 3 contact points because they believe this cartridge sounds best this way.

I've no idea if Ortofon was right, if 3 contact points sound "better" or "worse" than 2 or 4 or a flat surface - but I guarantee they'd all sound different.