Goldmund Studio/T3 with Helikon cartridge

Aha!! A lot of folks don't know this but:

Shure tracking force gauges are made with stainless steel and cant't be used with MC cartridges! The large magnets in MC cartridges throw off the reading by a gram or more depending on the cartridge. (The magnets in MM cartridges are very small and do not affect the reading with the Shure gauge.)

Get a good digital gauge if your tonearm provides no method for determining the VTF.

I've found that going from a Shure gauge to digital scales made a tremendous improvement in reliabile readings, I don't know if I necessarily agree with the magnet theory, but the scale WILL be much more precise. I do agree there is as much as a gram difference between the two.

I'd try it if I were you. Sometimes Occam's Razor works!

Well, that's an interesting bit of info that I hadn't heard before. One of the reasons I have the Shure guage is that I don't change cartridges or setup often enough to justify a very expensive VTF guage. The digital guages that I am aware of cost around $500 or maybe it was $400.

Any recommendations for an inexpensive solution that improves on the Shure guage (which cost me $20)?

Willster: Even if it weren't for the magnetically induced error of the Shure gauge, it doesn't provide the kind of accuracy I think you will want with your arm/cartridge if you want to achieve the best results. I have two recommendations:

There are many lower-priced digital guages, some here on Agon, sometimes at auction. I bought an Audio One Digital Stylus Pressure Gauge here at auction from "audioparts" for $157 about 3 months ago. It measures out to .01 gram (1/100) which is what you need for a MC cartridge. It's nothing fancy, but it does the job -- and for less than a tenth the price of my cartridge.

My other suggestion, and I wish I could be more specific, is that there are a few simple balance scales out there(like the Shure) made of non-ferrous materials. You'll have to do some Googling.

Make no mistake, the magnets in MC cartridges are extremely powerful for their size. The minute you revealed you were using a Shure gauge, I knew what the problem was. I've been there!

Nsgarch: +++++ " Shure tracking force gauges are made with stainless steel and cant't be used with MC cartridges! " +++++

Well, a few minutes ago I check my old Shure gauge against a digital gauge with four differents MC cartridges: everything is Ok. The top plate where the stylus touch the Shure gauge is made from aluminum, no problem. But I remember that I read, somewhere, that Shure have the steel version and the aluminum version. I'm not really sure about. But that's for sure that if exist the steel version, this one had a problem with MC cartridges. Yes, I agree on that.

Regards and enjoy the music.
Raul.