I know, the contemporary manufactures and your favorite audio publication’s fiction writers would suggest you opposite. But  the words have no weight if they are not justified by the actual results. Visit the actual listening rooms of any person who use light arms and listen his/her analog setup. Regardless of the needle, TTs and the phonocorrectors all of them, again: ALL OF THEM, have a farty upper bass that is not connecter to the rest of the music.  Their "light tonearms sound" is good enough to listen the "complexity" of the Klezmer bands but if you play with those tonearms something more serious, for instance the Boston Symphony Orchestra from 1940s, then you instantaneously recognize that the light tonearms are not acceptable for music.

So, what to do?   Load the headshells with mass. The typical contemporary tonearms with effective mass or 10g-14g should se the headshells of approximately of 30g-35g. If the contemporary MC cartridges are 8-12g then you have an idea how much you should load mass into your headshells. Try to distribute the added mass equally across the shell (right/left) and do not make the added mass ringy. I personally use silicone filling and if necessary implant into the silicon the lead shots.

Rgs,
Romy the Cat

Sure, add 20-30g to whatever you use now and you and then your Grado will become useable. I have seen in past that some Morons who put their ignorant opinions in a position to shaping the public knowledge (they called reviewers) have written that Grado cartridges require anb ultra light arm.  Ironically John Grado never objected it or corrected them. My initial reaction was that John is as clueless as a regular audio publication BS-writer but when I spoke with John he ask me: “What do you want form me – the contemporary industry unfortunately manufacture juts light arms. Do you want me to suggest to my customers the arms that they would not be able to find?” Anyhow, John Grado defiantly know what is going on but like anything else in audio – has his voce completely lost in the ocean of the BS expressed by the marketing fools. A few months ago I was visiting a guy who juts bought his new Graham tonearm for many thousands dollars. To listen this thing was imposable as this light arm floating in Vaseline sounded like a topping the belly of my Cat after she juts drank water. I suggested him to load this thing with at least 25g of extra mass. Instead, he grabbed from  his desk a review of some kind of reviewer-idiot and read to me that in the room of that reviewer his Graham 2.2 (that Graham gave to this reviewer as a free gift) sounded so wonderful that it’s sound was able to permanently cure the reviewer grandmother’s Parkinson Disease. What I am trying to say that in context of contemporary industry a manufacture himself no mater what he thing and feel about his product has no way to pass his message to the consumer as the message got completely overwritten but the marketing idiots. So, do you have to mass load your Grado? Probably, but not because I said so. Better would be to read the publications’ recommendations and  …. to do opposite. Until you get your own sense of what it right and wrong it would be good guideless…

Rgs,
Romy the caT

hifitodd wrote:

I'm trying to get my head around the tonearm/cartridge matching mechanics. First of all, are ALL cartridges much happier with a heavier tonearm?  Even cartridges with a high compliance? My understanding of a "correct" arm effective weight is one where the resonant frequency measures in between 8-11hz.  Won't adding 25g of mass to the headshell skew this relationship? Also - are there any currently commercial arms with a heavy and appropriate mass?

As I can see it there is a very simple tonearm/cartridge matching mechanics. The common knowledge suggest that Fs= 159/((M + CW) * C), where Fs is resonant frequency M is the mass of the arm, CW is the mass of the cartridge, including the mass of the screws, nuts, added mass, washers and etc, and C is the compliance of the cartridge.  The resonant frequency should be around 9H, so it is not difficult to figure out the relation between the compliance and the effective mass. The fun part that in a realty of practice this formula could be bended quite aggressively. With many, practically all cartridges that I tried I found out the increasing the mass of the cartridges even up to 3-4 times do not increase the resonant frequency at all. However, the increasing masses of the cartridges do increase quality of sound.

Here is how I add mass to my stereo MM cartridges. In the 3012 arm for instance the Shelter has more or less fixed resonant frequency: with or without the added mass. “Naked” it does around 9.5Hz and with loaded silicone making the headshell =30g the Fs dive to 9Hz. What the big deal!

Also, there are a lot of stories how analog sound if the resonant frequency is too low or too high. Thos stories re only partially correct and mostly should not be paid attention. I learned that when people make the Fs of 5Hz or 15Hz and receive a specific sound then they attribute this specificity of sound juts to Fs. It is mistake and the Fs itself has no sound but rather the methods that make the Fs too low and to high do affect sound. The stories about the “5Hz of resonant frequency that overwhelm the LF capacity of your power amplifiers” or would cause some modulations in power amps are juts the stories to threaten the brainless Morons at Audiogone. With a proper arm, good cartridge and reasonable playback even 5Hz of resonant frequency is no problem. At leas when I had it I heard nothing that would alike me to wory about Fs being too low.

Rgs,
Romy the Cat

AlexBerger wrote:

Romy, I use Ortofon Rondo Bronze with Nottingham Spacearm and Spacedeck. I hate Spacearm because bad tracking. Also, I can't add mass to Spacearm. I going to try a heavy tonearm. Fidelity Research FR-64FX with Ortofon Rondo Bronze (compliance is 15mm/uN) will be together around 31 gram. It's OK? Have you try high mass tonearm, instead off adding mass to head-shell? Why do you prefer SME 3012, 3009 to Fidelity Research? In equation: Fs= 159/((M + CW) * C), is compliance measured in mm/uN?

I do not believe in compliance measurement numbers. Compliance measurement is not unified and different companies measure compliance differently and therefore their numbers are bogus. Not to mention that there is an army of basement-made cartridges (owner operated companies) who do not even know how to measure compliance and they write any number they wish. There is another: “not to mention” reason. Those small “basement” companies not able to make two identical cartages with the same specification, they are purely technologically not equipped to do it. All their cartridges are in way are accidents.  You might read and hears that they are very pompoms about their ability to make cartridges with custom predictable sound. All those Sounds African masters and  Japanese masters and Switzerland Masters … in really it all pure BS, those people generally know a little about Sound and present to theirs accidental successes to the gullible audio Morons as intentional accomplishments. Go to those people and order from them 10 identical cartridges sand you will get 10 very differently sounding cartridges. It is not that they do not want but they just physically not able to handle it.

Well, if you feel that large companies can handle it then it might not be necessary true. The large companies like Ortofon for instance, where cartridges are made by machines shall be able to maintain some standards. But do not forget that maintaining of standards is important ONLY if there is mechanism of control, punishment and gratification for holding of the standards. In cartridges manufacturing, distribution and sale there is absolutely nothing that assure any quality. So, if tomorrow Ortofon will do cartridges with aluminum wires, cactus cantilever, toothpick needle and characteristics all over board then it will be absolutely no consequences for Ortofon. So, the large manufacturers do the same crap as anyone else, using the cheapest supplies and cheapest technologies available.

Another factor is interpretation of results. If you, me, or somebody else got that expensive and valuable cartridge then we can see the result ONLY from the perspective of this given accidental cartridge. This is not enough to make a conclusion about the entire model. Try to ask your dealer to get 10 cartridges and to pick the best – he will send you to hell as he never seen 10 cartridges together. The people who are in position to make generalization about the “model sound” are the distributors for instance but unfortunately they are idiots. Did you ever try to milk distributors to open their mouth about Sound? Whoever I have seen were fucking idiots but they are the defense line to protect customers against manufacturer’s quality randomness. 

Anyhow, considering all above I absolutely discard ANY cartridges measurement provided by manufacturers, including compliance. If you have a cartridge that you like then see how the cantilever bends and make your own judgment about compliance. The mass of the arm shall be determine base upon Sound and record reading, not base upon some abstract acrobatics with irrelevant numbers. Aleksey Tolstoy use to say: "If you see a "buffalo" sign on an elephant's cage, do not believe your eyes." So, I do not do it…