Bad experience with ZYX AIRY 3

All,

Owners of unweighted ZYX's using relatively low mass arms like JMW, Scheu Tacco, etc. would almost certainly benefit from additional mass at the headshell.

Try something simple and easily reversible, like a blob of Blu-Tak on top of the headshell or something.

How much mass to add? Thom's post above gives a clue. Subtract the effective mass of your arm from 18 or so. Add about that many grams to the headshell. Rebalance, reset VTF and play.

I think you'll be pleasantly surprised. The body, drive and weight that darkmoebius misses in his Fuji will probably show up, ready to boogie.

An unweighted ZYX on a low-medium mass arm could indeed be "soft at the frequency extremes" as Raul says, particularly at the low end. I'll wager that's what he's heard. I've heard it myself. On the right mass arm, however, I have not heard those problems.

As usual, best performance requires careful component matching and exacting setup. I'm certain Raul understands proper arm/cartridge setup. But I don't believe he's heard many ZYX's in his own system or had the time to do his usual extensive series of careful arm-matching tests.

Doug

Bada-Bing!!!

Thanks for re-iterating that point, Doug. I've read all the posts in this thread, yet somehow Thom's wise advice didn't hit home with me.

The effective mass of my Scheu Tacco is 14 grams, so I will try 4 grams of blue-tac later this week. Then, work my way up from there over time to see where the improvements stop.

Great news because here are already so many things that Fuji does well, some added body, weight, and authority will take it over the top.

I'll give it a week and report back my findings. The key thing, I think, will getting the blue-tack weight evenly spread on the headshell and rebalancing as you point out.

Many thanks to all the veterans who share their experiences around here.

Dear Chris: Of course your system page " urge " an update.
I know very well Avantgarde speakers and I like it specially the almost imposible ( for others speakers ) " inmediacy " presentation of the recorded music: like the real event!!!

I can " see " that you insist on tube technology in your system nice for you: all what I told you in my last post is the same about the use of that technology.

" The leading edge ", yes this is one of the problems. Btw, this leading edge is a live music characteristic and ZYX can't achieve it, till today.

+++++ " There isn't a system out there that can reproduce the real thing....... In the end, what we are all doing is reproducing a recording (which is a reproduction of the original event in the first place). So please don't talk to me about "veils" .......... I have spent too many years actually playing a musical instrument (that's me "live"), mixing "live" music, and recording "live" musicians to fall for that old cliche'. " +++++

I never say or presume that my system or any system can reproduce the " real thing ": of course it can't.

For the " old veils cliché ": I'm not talking of any cliché, what I'm talking is that in the way that you have less links/stages/veils in the original signal reproduction you will have a better quality sound reproduction, that's all.

Regards and enjoy the music.
Raul.

Subtract the effective mass of your arm from 18 or so.

Doug, what if the effective mas of the arm is 25-35 grams? Is this too much for a ZYX? My arm is an ET2 with 25-35 grams horizontal and 7 grams vertical effective masses. I'm thinking about a Bloom.

I am not sure the the compliance of the Bloom but my guess is you need a cartridge w. medium compliance or higher. Unless you can add weight at the headshell. Otherwise the bass will suffer.