Question on FR 66s

As Thuchan has mentioned......the FR-66s is possibly the most 'universal' tonearm ever designed?
The only modern arms which I have found to equal it (and the FR-64s) in this respect......are the Continuum Cobra and Copperhead.
I have directly compared the FR-64s and 66s to the DaVinci 12" Grandezza and the Graham Phantom II on the same turntables with a range of cartridges (both LOMCs and MMs)........and the Fidelity Research arms have a control and authority which is immediately obvious.
The images are stable and pinpoint whilst the soundstage is the widest and deepest you will hear if the vinyl contains this information.
The bass depth and control is quite astonishing.......but the real highlight I find.....is the complete relaxation that one feels when listening.
These arms allow one to forget entirely about the electro-mechanical gymnastics involved in the execution of musical extraction and completely immerse oneself in the music.
You will find it difficult to stop dragging out long forgotten records and re-discovering.
And the DaVinci and Phantom II arms?...........they're gone :-)

Hi Suteetat,

I also have an SX777 Air, and have once put in the FR64S with great result! I am interested at your mentioning of an armboard for the FR66s.

If I understand correctly, you can only fit 9"-10" arms on the 777! Actually, not long ago, I missed out on the rare model called 777L (long) which can fit 12" arms!

Thekong, you are right. I goofed and was mistaken an armboard for 777L for 777. Which might as well as another friend has been suggesting that now that I have 66s, I should sell my 64s to him. This way, I need to keep 64s for my 777!

Dear Suteetat, With some reluctance because of my 'technical know how' I need to mention my experience with difficult to get armboards. I discovered those chops which make all kinds of things from acrylic. Some of them use laser for the purpose. They can produce whatever armboard with whatever thickness very accurate. You need however to provide them with a good diagram or example with exact dimensions for the arm geometry. My Kuzma S.R. consist of much acrylic but in conjunction (aka 'sandwich')with aluminum plates. I also owned some P.Lurne TT's ( Audiomeca J1) with similar 'sandwich' construction with acrylic . Not to mention my German ASR 'artillery' (Basis
Exclusive and Emitter II ) 'loaded' with acrylic. So I deduced:' this stuff can't be bad '(?).Except that is when one try to clean the damn stuff. My own added problem is the fact that I fear the cleaning ladies as the ony kind of the human kind. So I decided to do without and do this job myself. It shows alas. I just spend 6000 euro for the new carpets , new curtains and paintwork.

Regards,

Hi Nandric, I had similar thought about machine shop to make my own arm board also. Many of my friends use these shops to make arm board for various arms so I do have access to some local shop here, both metal and acrylic. Unfortunately in the case of SX-777, to install 66s, I would need to cut a new hole on the table itself as well since phono wire came out from the bottom of the mount. With the standard arm board, in the usual position on 777, no matter where I cut the hole on the armboard, there is not enough distance to accommodate 66s P2S.
Right now I am perfectly happy using 66s on my "other" turntable :)