"Making Mono" for checking Azimuth

Any suggestions for the SME system (or apparent lack thereof)?

Cousinbilly1,

The styli on even the best cartridges may vary 2-3 degrees from vertical (per JCarr of Lyra, who once posted candidly about manufacturing tolerances). It wouldn't be surprising if cutting styli varied similarly.

Aren't you glad you have the ears and gear to hear the difference? Welcome to the Yellow Sticky Note Club! <:~)

By all means start saving for the Telos... and ship the Talea II to us for the extended evaluation it deserves. ;)

Agree I'm very lucky to have Paul, and red wine too!

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My blushes, Almarg!

I concur with Stringreen, except to note that even the best cartridge manufacturers' styli may vary from vertical by 2-3 degrees (see above). Therefore, levelling the headshell for azimuith is somewhat like levelling the armtube for SRA: it's not an unreasonable place to begin but in a resolving system it's not the place to stop either.

When feasible, my own preference is always to adjust what matters, which is the attitude of the STYLUS in the GROOVE.

In contrast, I know of a guru who claims that if your optimal azimuth is more than 2 degrees off vertical, you should send your cartridge back to the maker as defective. I do not agree, but he is quite adamant that in most cases azimuth adjust is not necessary, off 90 degrees.

Doug, Perhaps this is blasphemy of another sort, but have you ever checked the actual electrically determined crosstalk after adjusting azimuth by ear?

Lew,

I'll wager that guru made more pronouncements than cartridges. ;)

Yes, I've compared adjusting by listening vs. adjusting by measurement. I used to use a Wally Analog Shop (which allows measurement of crosstalk at the amp outputs using 1 KHz test tones). While using that, I learned that I could adjust by ear just as accurately and faster.

Peter,

Sorry for the thread-jackings and I wish I had something useful to suggest. Like Lewm's guru, SME's original tonearm designers tended to assume perfection in cartridges. Their arms lack the easy adjustability of all parameters that's typical of newer designs from other manufacturers. Build quality, finish and ease of use are excellent, but complete adjustability was evidently not a design priority.

The aforementioned guru does in fact use an SME V tonearm. Funny how that works.