Tweaking the new Grado Timbre Sonata 3

I understand your impatience. We all want instant gratification. Streengreen is exactly right; be patient. In my experience, 10 hours is not nearly enough; even for Grados which are not nearly as finicky as some other cartridges. I think you will be confusing matters, and yourself, by trying all sorts of tweaks before letting the cartridge settle. What you describe as the “problem” is exactly in line with what I have experienced with some new cartridges. Don’t do anything yet, other that ballpark adjustments of VTA. Good luck.

Mijo,

I got the low output 1mv. The Nagaoka was 2.5mv and it was more than plenty, almost too much, so I went with the low output Grado. Works great from a volume aspect.

Frogman,

I will wait. It seems the prudent advice. 

I had Grados for many years...cartridges, headphones....they all need lots of time before they dance. Be patient

+1...I was a Grado dealer for many years and have owned a ton of their stuff.  I probably have at least a dozen different Grado cartridges in the corral right now.

IMHO, the regular Grado carts need about 40-50 hours and the wood body carts need about 80-100 of break/burn-in.  YMMV.

A resistor can be soldered in series with the hot lead either inside the RCA or inside the phono stage. If its a big deal go for it. Otherwise if guys are saying Grado can be slow to loosen up then wait and see.

Yes, but if he wants to adjust his existing 47k --> 10k he needs to put it in parallel, not series.  Since 10k II 47k = ~ 8.2k, use something like 15k.  I have no idea if that's the right load. I use 47k on mine and its certainly not too bright.  ask John.

Very few manufacturers of the phono stages will give you optional load for MM/MI, for this reason I am using JLTi Phono stage with special mod made by the manufacturer for me. I can use whatever resistors (RCA plug- in parallel) for my MM or MC cartridges, because internal load resistors in my JLTi is 500 000 Ohm, for my MM or MI i can use whatever up to 100 000 Ohm (100k Ohm).

For all my MM/MI I’m using 47k - 100k Ohm.

But if i want to load it i can do that to 10k or whatever.

Apart from Grado the OP is referring to, I have never seen any other cartridge with recommended load resistors range from 10k to 47k given by the manufacturer.

But very often the recommended range is 30k - 100k Ohm for MM.

The 47k Ohm is not mandatory for MM or MI cartridges and never was!