New Tweak --- Its Fantastic


THE NEW TWEAK

Over the good part of this past year I’ve been beta testing a new tweak, the name of which is "Total Contact." Its a hi-bred graphene contact enhancer that is different from all other contact enhancers that have come and gone for one reason or another. I’m not new to these contact enhancers, having had quite a bit of experience with a product developed by the late Brian Kyle and his "Quick Silver" contact enhancer. The "Total Contact" is different ... a LOT different.

"Total Contact" is graphene based and is not a vibration control. It eliminates micro-arching between two contacts. Micro-arching, much like Micro-vibration smears the sound in our stereo systems. Its the type of distortion that we don’t know is there .... until we eliminate it. There is no break-in as we know it. The sound is improved right off the bat, but what you hear is only a smidgen of what’s to come.

I tested three generations of "TC," each of which was an improvement over the previous incarnation. The final mix was cryogenitically treated and made for a more effective, much smoother application. It comes in a large hypodermic needle type plunger containing 1.5 ml of product and includes a instructional DVD and an application brush.

The application should be applied with a very thin coat to all of your electrical connections .... from your cartridge pins to your power cords. I did my entire system, including the ends of my fuses.

Upon initial application, you will notice an improvement in clarity, correctness of tonal balance and a more overall organic sound. But ... that is just scratching the surface of what this magic paste does. As it cures, the improvements become more apparent. Much more!

There are two real break-through events that happen almost to the day with "Total Contact," one at four weeks and another at eight weeks . At four weeks, you’ll get a real jump in clarity and overall improvement. That’s only a taste though of what’s to come at eight weeks. At eight weeks your system’s focus will make a jump in SQ that is so real - its surreal.

After 40 years in the hobby, and a total tweak nut, I have never heard anything that does what this graphene paste does. The see-through clarity at eight weeks becomes simply amazing. The "paste" eventually cures into a kind of polymer plastic and it seems that the sound improves with each listening session. So, its important that you leave your contacts alone for the duration. If you’re the type of person that continually switches wires in and out, you’ll have to re paste until enough time has elapsed to get "the cure."

The only problem I had was with the first batch and that had to do with shorting out a tube pin in the line stage. Use the "TC" very sparingly on tube pins, if at all. I only had problems with the line stage tube pins. The Amp, CD Player and Phono Stage has had no tube pin problems at all.

Tim Mrock, one of our fellow A’goners, is the developer of the product. Its taken Tim 15 years and several patents to get it right. Tim has "pasted" every electrical contact he can find in his audio system, all of the switches in his circuit breaker box, every contact in his car ... and has used it in commercial applications such as hospital circuit breakers, surgical lights ... and other places where efficiency and long life of electrical components are deemed important.

This product is highly recommended to anyone who truly wants to get the most out of his/her audio systems. There’s enough product in each tube to do at least two audio systems as it just takes a very thin coat on each application to be effective. The last tube was enough to do my system twice and then a friend’s system this past weekend.


Frank

PS: There were a couple of other A’goner beta testers of this product as well. Hopefully, they will chime in here with their experiences for comparison. I "pasted" both of Steve Fleschler’s systems a few days ago, perhaps he will comment on his results too. We forgot to paste Steve’s power cords though, so there’s a lot more to be had from Steve’s two fantastic systems.

Frank
128x128oregonpapa
^^^

I experienced the same improvement when I did the pins on my AT Art-9.

Has anyone else hit the eight week point yet?

Frank
I am at 4 weeks on my tube pins in my Int. Amp and 3 weeks on the folloeing: Silnote Anniersary bi-wire speaker cables, my Teo Ultra interconnect and several SR Blue fuses. I still haven't touched my power cords though. The sound has definitely improved again over where it was two weeks ago when I last reported. I did feel that last weekend the sound may have slipped back a little. I thought I was hearing some sibilance on some of the treble area here and there. This week though a real nice increase in tonal texture and tonal density and furthering of the 3 dimensionality to the soundstage. Very happy. I can't wait to hear this system with my soon to be modded by Ric Schultz of EVS Oppo 205.
Frank,

My week later application of the power chords, power strip, television, and power conditioner just hit the eight week period in my main system. All I can say is that this product has done everything that was promised on cue. The music is much more dynamic at lower volume levels. The detail, top to bottom, is incredible without any hard glare. The Power of the music is also communicated with the appropriate force and tone color.

Just to give a bit of perspective as to the level of improvement that took place at the 4 and 8 week curing points of the TC treatment, I think this might be helpful. The 4 week period was just as noticeable as when I installed a Shunyata “ Venum Defender” along with an Audience AU24 SE-i M Powerchord into my main system at the same time a year and 3 months ago. Further, About 6 months ago I finished breaking in an Audience AU24-SX interconnect between my amp and preamp and that was incredible. However, this last 8 week curing period was just as incredible as that experience. All this improvement came without any draw backs, save one SHORT term issue, I noticed on both systems at there 8 week break-in periods. 

With about 3 to 4 days left in the eight week period, the system got very bright for 3 days. I hesitated to report this since it cleared up on the office system right at the 8 week deadline. However, It has not reoccurred on the office system which passed the 8 week perriod two weeks ago.

This product has proven itself in my system in an incredible way in audio terms. It won’t be coming off. I am very glad I tried it and would recommend it if the upgrade bug hits.

Thanks for taking the hits while helping Tim bring this product to market. I have never participated in any kind of forum prior to this and I am glad that I did. Now I enjoy listening to music more than ever.

My audio dealer/friends will surely be kept informed on my systems progress since they asked me to keep them apprised. One said after six months, another said one year.

Now it’s time for me to treat the rest of my interconnects in my main system. I will keep you guys posted.

Thanks,

rc


^^^  
And it seems to just get better as time goes by. The listening session tonight was incredible. The SR Blue fuse (end caps pasted with TC) is breaking in nicely in my Grover Huffman CD player, and boy the combination is amazing. We were listening to the Ramsey Lewis Trio and the realism was uncanny. The drums were most noticeable in their rightness and the bass was right there. Ramsey Lewis' piano was out of tune in all of its glory. Zowie!

Frank
I just want to share a few notes about my experience with TC, which I paid full price for. My system is a Equi=Core 1800/Core Power Technologies feeding everything; MacBookPro running BitPerfect and iTunes>USB Disruptor cable>Schiit Yggy (v1 and Gen5 USB)>Clarus Crimson XLR>ARC REF6>Clarus Crimson XLR+Audioquest Irish Red Sub Cable>MartinLogan BF210 sub and >ARC REF150SE>Clarus Crimson Speaker Cable or TA Gen5 Ultra>MartinLogan CLXs.

The first weekend, I pasted all the power connections from the wall to the 1800 and out to all the components, except the IEC connectors on the REF6 and Yggy. I noticed an immediate drop in the noise floor, even though I had not been aware that I had a noise problem. All the music came out of a blacker black and I could hear more fine details.

The second weekend I pasted the outside grounds of the USB cables, the IEC connector and XLR cables coming out of the Yggy, and the cables going into the ARC REF150SE and ML BL210 sub. There was again a noticeable improvement. After hearing Laurie Anderson perform at the Town Hall in NYC in February, I have become quite taken with her new album with the Cronus Quartet, entitled "Landfall" (44.1kHz/24bit files). What become quite clear after this second round of pasting was that the violin phrase that opens the first track, "CNN Predicts a Monster Storm", was not one violin, but very clearly two. Likewise, on other parts of this track where I thought it was one instrument, it was now clearly two (e.g., viola and cello). Beautiful music made even more captivating with TC.

The third weekend, my Herbie’s tube dampers (HTDs) had arrived and I replaced all the tubes in the REF6 with new ARC tubes with HTDs, but not before pasting the tube pins. Also the IEC connector, along with all the input and output cables. Again, a clearly audible improvement was heard. The instruments in the Kronos Quartet became even more obviously separate and the human voice (including Laurie Anderson) would at times become spookily realistic. Great stuff.

On the fourth weekend, I went skiing in the Canadian Rockies, but on my return last night and again tonight, the system sounds amazing. So much detail and realism. I have a few things left to paste:

1. SR Blue Fuse in REF6, once I decide proper orientation
2. Tube pins in ARC REF150SE, after installing HTDs
3. Speaker cables, once I decide which of the two are better in this system.

I am traveling again this weekend, so these final touches will have to wait for week six. I would have preferred to do everything at once, that was not possible with my other responsibilities.

In terms of order of magnitude of improvement of TC, I will make one comparison and that is to replacing the mains fuse of the REF6 with the SR Blue. The first week improvement of pasting the power connections had approximately twice the beneficial effect than the fuse. Everything after that has been a further improvement. So, in terms of value of Blue fuses vs. TC, TC is the clear winner.

Jim