[Scott Dorsey]

Paul Stamler wrote:
"Scott Dorsey" wrote in message
...

Really, though, you want to replace that 1019 with something that doesn't
rumble and has a better arm. At the very least replace the arm on the
1019.
You will be amazed at how much lower your perceived noise floor is with an
arm that isn't so ringy.

The trouble is that, because of all the interlinks, it's really hard to
replace the 1019 arm. If you're stuck with a 1019, one thing that does help
is to put some rings of Mortite on the shaft. Make a donut at the halfway
point, then flatten it out. Do the same at the point 2/3 of the way out, and
at the point where the shaft joins the pivot assembly. This will help a bit
with the ringiness -- won't solve it, but will bring it down some. It'll
also increase the mass of the arm, probably not bad when dealing with
lower-compliance cartridges.

The Mortite will go a long way toward reducing the ping. But really,
it's not that hard to replace the arm because the solution for dealing
with the interlinks is to THROW THEM AWAY. In fact, you probably want
to gut out a lot of the autochange mechanism anyway, because it goes far
toward increasing the pivot friction on the arm. Tear all that junk out
and turn it into a manual table.

Yes, it will. If at all possible the person asking the question should find
something better than the 1019. Ideally a Thorens with a good suspension,
but a Connoisseur will work as long as the belt is fresh. (Take the belt off
when you're not using it to avoid its getting all stretched out.)

Music Hall is now making some decent inexpensive turntables, although
they cannot do 78s.

Do the current Grado 78 styli fit the rest of their cartridge line, or only
the dedicated 78 rpm cartridges?

The DJ-100 is normally shipped with a spherical stylus, but the 78 stylus
and the elliptical stylus from the ZTE+1 will fit it. The DJ-100 with an
elliptical stylus is a good combination.

The 78 stylus will fit most of the lower-end Grado cartridges although
some of the higher end ones have a slightly different mount. You might
be able to X-acto it to work, though.

And in either case you need to watch out for warps if you use a Grado, else
the dreaded Grado Wobble sets in. I keep a Stanton 500 around for warpy
records.

Warps aren't the only thing that will cause the thing to start gradoing.
The low end cut onto a lot of latin records will just cause it to go
berserk. The DJ-100 is much better in that regard, however, than the
more expensive Grados. I really think it's the best thing in their lineup.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."