Consider the dear old Shure 97xe...it's £70! And it's great.

[Wakefield Turntables]

I think the lugs are for the missing stylus guard.

[CornishPasty]

Mine is grey and has a flip down stylus guard attached. I also have the aforementioned M97xe with both Shure and Jico stylus. I must admit I haven't listened to it much and have never taken the Jico stylus out of the wrapper. It's done maybe seventy hours on its own stylus and I think I put it away because I preferred the AT440MLb. I might dig it out this weekend and give it some exercise.

[Wakefield Turntables]

Here's the Shure with it's swanky new Ortofon Magnesium head shell and high purity copper cartridge and gold plated tags. The pins got a very good clean before fitting with brasso and then IPA to clean any residue and then a final buff with a few cotton buds. The cart is sitting on my 301 whilst I rewire my old Rega tonearm. It sounds great and well worth a punt if you can find one. Things should be lifted to another level with the new JICO stylus.

DSCN2610.jpg

[hermit]

I've been using a Shure v15iii with a Jico SAS for the last couple of months and am very taken with it. It's very even handed, detailed and images superbly. It more than holds its own with my Goldring Eroica LX and Dynavector DV20XH.

[Wakefield Turntables]

Here's my old beast with the new replacement £40 Jico stylus from Japan. It arrived today and sounds fantastic. I've not paid particular attention to cartridge alignment and my 3012 arse end could do with being dropped a few mm's as it's not quite level. So far this little adventure has cost me £64. This is a fantastic cartridge and well worth a punt if you can find one. I have the Shure V15mk3 and VN35MR stylus and whilst the little Shure isn't as good as it's big brother it's not that far behind. I think Jim and Marco got the sonic characteristics of this cart nailed. Even handed, great soundstaging, reasonable space bewteen instruments, laid back. Surface noise virtually non-existant. I've found the cart works well with a decent record weight, several of my pressing are not quite flat and whilst the little shure tracks well it can be improved by flattening out the vinyl with the record weight. I'll be a little more fastidious with the carts setup tomorrow and get some decent listening done.


DSCN2619.jpg

Latest incarnation of my M55E.

[Jimbo]

Here's my old beast with the new replacement £40 Jico stylus from Japan. It arrived today and sounds fantastic. I've not paid particular attention to cartridge alignment and my 3012 arse end could do with being dropped a few mm's as it's not quite level. So far this little adventure has cost me £64. This is a fantastic cartridge and well worth a punt if you can find one. I have the Shure V15mk3 and VN35MR stylus and whilst the little Shure isn't as good as it's big brother it's not that far behind. I think Jim and Marco got the sonic characteristics of this cart nailed. Even handed, great soundstaging, reasonable space bewteen instruments, laid back. Surface noise virtually non-existant. I've found the cart works well with a decent record weight, several of my pressing are not quite flat and whilst the little shure tracks well it can be improved by flattening out the vinyl with the record weight. I'll be a little more fastidious with the carts setup tomorrow and get some decent listening done.


DSCN2619.jpg

Latest incarnation of my M55E.

Glad you enjoyed this absolute bargain cartridge Andy.

[Marco]

Nice one, Andy. Glad it worked out well. AoS is all about helping folk identify these little gems

Marco.

[DSJR]

On Vinyl Engine somewhere, there are many threads discussing Shure cartridge bodies. I seem to remember there being around five basic types, all with different fittings and coil-resistances, but these bodies were then spread over the entire production run.

My V15 III's can sound relentless with the stock original styli I have, but I remember being shocked by the improvement the later red 'HE' stylus gave - air and some real depth perspective. I don't think the 'MR' was ever imported to the UK in any quantity, but I suspect it would have improved things further as it seemed to do with the V15VMR. I tried again with the V15T2 (new stock stylus) and it's just too dull for me, although the bass and mids are sublime.

I'm now way out of touch, but are Jico working on an SAS replacement stylus?

[Barry]

Certainly the Shure V15 Mk. IV, fitted with the MR stylus, was a significant improvement over the stock V15 III.

I gave up with Shure after the V15 III, and switched my alligance to Ortofon and Decca, but I was pleasantly surprised by the V15 IV after listening to my friend's sample.

[karma67]

I've just joined the 55 club, woke up from my afternoon kip to see one just listed on eBay. Comes with original box and a NOS stylus.