Eminent Technology ET-2 Tonearm Owners

Hi everyone, very interesting topic! I have obtained a used ET2 with Bruce’s upgrade 2.5 bearing, but have yet to set it up.

I am very interested in the discussion on the I-beam compliance. As far as I can tell, the arm on the Walker Proscenium turntable (which is of similar design to the ET2) has a direct couple counterweight. Since the Walker is being regarded as one of the best, I was thinking of modifying the ET2 in such manner.

I wonder what are the pros and cons to the 2 different approaches.

ketchup

I originally tried the 0.003 wire(0.005 coated) from phoenix, but just could not get a good solder connection and breaking the wire pretty easily while trying to handle the rca plugs.I got tips about sanding the teflon off and that did help improve the soldering process.

also the thickness wire i was discussing was the coated diameter. If you are nifty with handling the fine wire, the smaller diameter is the way to go. If the diameter is too large, the wire is too stiff and will impact the freeplay of the tonearm. Sorry about not discussing the smaller diameter earlier. I went back to the spools i actually used, and the 0.005 bare (0.007) was very similar to the 0.003 wire from Phoenix in my ability to handle (ie, hard to handle without breaking or getting a good solder connection). The 0.008 bare (0.011 coated) is what is I am using on my tonearm. The 0.010 bare(0.013 coated) was easier to handle but was a little to stiff for my application. I did not mention earlier the type of air pump I use but my apollo uses the original superquiet pump from maplenoll but my ariadne signature uses a JunAir compressor which i really like. Very quiet and dependable. It also has a good air regulation control system that i like.

Thekong, congratulations! As should be clear so far, we feel this is a terrific arm. And if you enjoy tinkering...well, you'll be in heaven. I think the ET's reputation for requiring a lot of maintenance is exaggerated and unjustified, as I have found that once you have it set up well it will stay that way; pretty much. As a footnote, I have my TNT on a wall mounted platform bolted directly into the wooden studs in a wall of a 100+ year-old house. I have wondered why the arm needed rebalancing every few months. Then I started to notice a pattern. I realized that the seasonal shifting of the studs/walls due to seasonal temperature changes was causing the arm to need rebalancing.

I would be very interested in learning how you accomplished direct-coupling of the counterweights, so please keep us posted. As posted earlier, I made an I-beam with less compliance than even the double spring stock version in an attempt to get vas close as possible to a dc arrangement. Apbii, does a good job of explaining the theoretical pros/cons of more or less compliance at the I-beam spring. From the standpoint of sonics what I can tell you is (as Ct found out out) that the effects of less compliance are not subtle. As always, you will have weigh your personal tonal balance preferences against what will be a much better organized sound, with more tightly controlled imaging and over-all leaner sound. You may also come across a cartridge that simply requires higher compliance for good tracking; I have not owned one that didn't track at least adequately with the lower compliance I-beam.

If you want to experiment with really low compliance tightly coupled counterweight you could just wedge something like a tooth pick in the joint to essentially remove the spring from the equation. I think Bruce mentions this somewhere, in any event I didn't invent it, just passing it on.

Frogman..Good point on the wall mount, I usually check the TT level often for that very reason.
Ketchup.. Thanks for the tip on shim stock.

With regards to the damping trough... if the best results come from the paddle lightly touching the fluid, would there be any sonic difference in trying different weights of fluid or is that going way too far out in left field. Has anyone tried this?