Dear pindac, the expression ''it depends'' is short and easy to remembar and
very smart as reminder not to use quantifier ALL when starting from our
own opinion. I owned all Ikeda's FR 7 kinds. Those are from the 80is.
Each of them was perfect in technical sense but I decided to keep F7,ez.
I also got after waiting for for 2 years his REX, the cantileveless kind.
Both are my most precious ''darlings''. No idea how he deed ''it'' but I have
never heard complaints about his dampers. In contradistinction the recent
purchased ZYX had defective damper. I ever started an thread about
IRREPARBLE carts. To my big surprise nobody was interested. My
reason was Sony XL 88D (D for diamond ). I am not sure if back than
acrilic existed so i will name it ''plastic body''. Gloed together and provided
with damping material inside to dampen resonaces. But there was no
way to get IN for any repair. So my friend Axel Shurholz, who described
this ''stuff'' as glue was not able to fix this ''wonder''. Our architect
from Australia calld AUSSIE declared this cart as the best he
ever owned. Mori-san made two innovations for this XL sereis.
8 form coils and internal damping. In the 80is one could buy
an Volkswagen for its price. So whatever the function of time
may be ''deterioration'' is not always the case. BTW also
all my Kiseki's from the 80 are much better then the ''brand
new'' kind. The later are ''collectivly'' offered for sale while
my Agaat and Black heart are nowhere to find.