Marco's latest vintage marvel....

[Dominic Harper]

A worn stylus and or azimuth issues will cause sibilance. It is very tricky to inspect a stylus for azimuth without a microscope. There are alot of old and new styli incorrectly aligned, and even if you check arm azimuth, this is no indication stylus is correct.

[Dr Bunsen Honeydew]

While we are going on about old things, I would be fascinated by anyone trying a Sonotone 9tahc. It is ceramic so you will have to keep the volume down as it has loads of output, far more than a moving magnet.

Now these were largely only fitted to radiograms and record players and the Garrard 1025tc autochanger, but I remember them having zonking dynamics if a little limited in HF and not exactly flat across the frequency band, some would say full of character.

Richard

[Marco]

Back in the very early 70's I was working for G.W Smith & Co who was one of the constituent parts of what became the Audiotronic group that traded as Laskys. I remember every Saturday at 257 Tottenham Court road we would sell about 100 TT packages that consisted of a Garrards SP25 in a Alan Sugar plinth and cover with a Goldring G800. AND every Monday morning there would be at least 10 of them back having shed their stylus as soon as they were asked to play a record, so I was very jaundiced towards them.

I'm not surprised, Richard, as that's precisely what happened to one of the NOS ones I bought!

Interestingly when they tried to go up market with the G800 super E to try and compete with the likes of the Shure V15 (everyone aspired to SME / Shure V15) it didn't really work, the low compliance with a high mass body made the thing warbly and unstable.

I haven't tried the 'E', but the more I hear about it from those that have, the more I'm almost certain that it wouldn't be my cup of tea.

Marco.

[Rare Bird]

I'm amazed people are hankering over the 'G800' & not the 'G900's !

[Dr Bunsen Honeydew]

I haven't tried the 'E', but the more I hear about it from those that have, the more I'm almost certain that it wouldn't be my cup of tea.

Marco.

The E was just an eliptical G800, the G800 super E was a different beast. And the G900 was horrible, they lost it at that point.

This has a copy of a super E review from about 1969 and other interesting things http://www.saturn-sound.com/history/...%20reviews.htm

[kininigin]

A worn stylus and or azimuth issues will cause sibilance. It is very tricky to inspect a stylus for azimuth without a microscope. There are alot of old and new styli incorrectly aligned, and even if you check arm azimuth, this is no indication stylus is correct.

Im leaning towards a worn stylus rather than incorrect azimuth.

I might sell my nagaoka and send you my G800 for a retip,i'll wait till you do yours though and see what you think of it in your system.

[chris@panteg]

While we are going on about old things, I would be fascinated by anyone trying a Sonotone 9tahc. It is ceramic so you will have to keep the volume down as it has loads of output, far more than a moving magnet.

Now these were largely only fitted to radiograms and record players and the Garrard 1025tc autochanger, but I remember them having zonking dynamics if a little limited in HF and not exactly flat across the frequency band, some would say full of character.

Richard

Hi Richard

I'm almost 100% certain my Dad had one of these in his radiogram , from about 1970 , did it have a flip over stylus for 78's ?

[Dominic Harper]

Darren, I have tried the re-tipped G800 on my Garrard 301/sme combo and was stunned at what I heard. Bear in mind, that was a spherical tip! no sibilance whatsoever, tracking about 2.5g.

[Dr Bunsen Honeydew]

Hi Richard

I'm almost 100% certain my Dad had one of these in his radiogram, from about 1970, did it have a flip over stylus for 78's ?

Yup! you can still buy stylus for them at ebay. They were just far better beasts than the crystals like Ronette and BSR. They could actually play music in a very characterful way

[chris@panteg]

Yup! you can still buy stylus for them at ebay. They were just far better beasts than the crystals like Ronette and BSR. They could actually play music in a very characterful way

Yes and its where my music loving journey started i guess , listening to my Dad's ' Wagner , Beethoven and Tchaikovsky records

The Gram had a Bush reciever as i remember it and of course the Garrard autochanger.

I remember playing some Genesis to him ! He listened to all of it and then said to me its a bit of an acquired taste and too repetitive , bless him