FR64s & Orsonic Av-1s Effective mass ?

Dear @lewm : Agree with you, there are several ways to damp a tonearm. Maybe as many as tonearm manufacturers but some of them just choose not to damp its designs.

Technics not only comes with that damping mechanism at the counterweigth but the blend materials used on the arm wand and even in the MK2 the Boron/aluminum hedashell has additional top plate damping.
Normally designers damp his designs not only in one way but use 2-3 ways to do it at the same timwe in diferent tonearm places.

The build materials per se sometimes are choosed by its damping characteristics as is the case of wood tonearm designs. Silicon damping mechanism along build material as SME: silicon plus dampening and magnesium. Damping at the bearing as magnetism or as in the unipivots. Others damps the internal arm wand as Lustre or AT. Micro Seiki MAX models are very good damped.

Btw, I don't like FR tonearms not because steel choosed build material but because is a non-damped design anywhere.

The enemy of the cartridge signal are: resonances/vibrations/distortions created and that's why every single tonearm and removable headshell must be damped. No single doubt about.

Almost everythhing in the analog front end is about damping. With out it we have and are listening just " sound"noise " but no MUSIC, high quality level performance.

As many things in audio and especially in the analogue experience is that people just don't want to learn and don't care to improve and grow up and live " happy " sticky in is each one " deep black hole " and they will " die " for.

Damping is critical everywhere in the system audio chain it does not matters if our system is a modest one or a megabuks one.

For me is just " ridiculous " ( for say the least " ) that today many of us are in love with undamped audio items !! and are proudly to " spread " that undamped BS and that's part of the audio world HIGH END ( ?? ) market niche where we all live. Makes no sense to me and I'm sure makes no sense to you. A free world!

Regards and enjoy the music,
R.

Raul, Audio is not an exact science. In fact, it's not a science at all, and logic does not always predict what will sound best.  Thus, while I take your point on damping or "dampening", I still can listen to my FR64S and say "Holy Cow that's good".  I am trying to do some research on why it does sound good despite the problems you cite. One possible saving grace of my set-up is that I have the FR64S mounted in its B60 base adjuster, which adds mass closely coupled to the arm structure, and the B60 is in turn mounted into a massive aluminum arm board that is one piece with a bigger piece of alu bolted to the bottom of the plinth.  One theory is if you give the mechanical energy a good pathway into a high mass object, the energy will dissipate as heat without the ability to induce motion.  It's really dampening by another mechanism. I don't insist this is true; it's just a thought.

The FR64S is one of the great pickup arms of all time, so I'm not sure what Raul's trouble with it is. I sold mine - complete with adjustable VTA base - to a friend who still uses it. It still sounds terrific! Of course, not every arm is necessarily at its best in every table, so perhaps that's where Raul got confused about it.

cleeds, While Raul’s English may be a bit fractured at times, he is never "confused" about any of his underlying beliefs, as I am sure he will soon tell you, where the FR64S is concerned. But I agree with you; I set mine up expecting the kinds of problems Raul has repeatedly described, but I don’t hear them so far. In fact, I am breaking other rules as well, using a high mass arm with a high compliance cartridge (Acutex LPM320). I am still giving Raul the benefit of the doubt, because I do respect his opinion, except when he accuses me of "liking" distortions. Before I draw final conclusions I need to replace the 64S with some other tonearm that is both lower in effective mass and higher in "dampening" characteristics, keeping the turntable (Victor TT101 in re-enforced plinth) and cartridge constant.