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starboy wrote:

I would have left this alone but the facts and truth will out... 1) The Mantis was well known to me and others around me before Andre joined V.E. though maybe not to you Americans. 2) There are possibly 2 owners other than myself on V.E. (with its tens of thousands of members) who own a Mantis. B50 was also requested not to review the cart' on the site. I myself did so though he did not want it... (Seeing this commotion he was right and I was wrong). Also, if that is the place to pimp a product then the b__ch will never have your money. It is though a very very good site regardless of a few baboons and I noticed even you made contributions to other threads. 3) I was priviledged to gain testimonials I could verify away from V.E. from owners in S.A., USA and Europe. Some of the cartridges these owners owned and moved away from were beyond my dreams I may say. I also know Andre has heard his Mantis in much larger than my audio installation. 4) The Mantis was purchased based on the sound that I heard and not internet hype which sadly is how I attained a 901. (It was cheap, what can I say but it did deliver during its tenure but I will never buy a cartridge this way again). 5) Yes, I feel if so many did not approach the thread things may have been different, alas... Anyway, one less person in the queue for my rarer than a unicorn Gaiac wood version.... Let's keep it small and bespoke like a Saville Row suit... If you've never had one made for yourself I can't explain..

Anyhow, since we were talking about Mantis there is one moment that I felt “and issues” while I spoke with Andre. This is a pure my “common sense” and it might not have any practical meaning; however it was what was in my head. I did not ask Andre over the telephone and I did not follow up about it on the sire or in email. Still, if I decided to pursue the Mantis cartridge then I would consider this moment and would be trying to obtain a satisfaction.

Andre told and you can see it on the picture that his cartridge has bolt somewhere in the mid of the body. This bold serves as copyright protection devise and this bolt also fine tunes some specific aspects of sound, stressing the cartridge body in a certain way. That is fine and I used the very same approach in my former version of Super Melquiades I was trying to comfort the buzzing of the multiple power transformers and chokes on the metal steel chassis. I had a large locking bolt driven across the whole chassis to the opposite wall and having all transformers and chokes rung I was turning a nut on this bold tuning off the harmonics of the noise. It was very effective, but I did detect that after a few hours when the power supply was getting hot I need to retune the tightness of the bolt.

So, let pretend that Mantis used the same idea and let presume that when Andre relies the cartridge it is perfectly tuned in accordance… to Andre’s playback. Sure any further influences (stresses) that might impact the perfections of the Mantis’ bolt tightness would be minor BUT the amplitude of the tightness change I presume need to be VERY minor in order to set Mantis off the “perfect Andre’s original setting of the bolt”. Let see what might stress a cartridge body:

1) Temperature. I think 10-15 degree of Fahrenheit are reasonable in listening room, would it affect sound of the fine-tuned bolt?

2) Force with which the bolts attached Mantis to it’s headshell.

3) The natural release of the cartridge body’s bolt (if it is not stooped by various menace)

I is possible that it is all not important but I think it is the issues and I do not like the idea of fastidious tuning of body of the cartridge by well-intended stress. I did not see anybody raised this question, so I did…

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