Andy Kim - Needle Clinic

Just had fantastic interaction with Andy Kim and Needle Clinic. I sent him a Sumiko Songbird for re-tipping and it came back sounding significantly better than the original. He also completed the work and shipped the cartridge back to me the same day he received it. Oh, and you can reach him by phone, which was great because he convinced me I could re-install the cartridge myself vs. taking it to the stereo shop. Could not recommend Andy more highly.

Andy replaced the stylus on my 20+ year old Linn Arkiv.  It now sounds fabulous--much better in every way.  He was also very helpful to me.  I had a difficult time removing the cartridge from the Linn tone arm and was concerned about damage I might cause putting the "new" cartridge back in.  I brought it to Andy and he did it for me.  I can't recommend Andy enough.  

Andy replaced the stylus on my 20+ year old Linn Arkiv in one day.  It now sounds fabulous--much better in every way.  He was also very helpful to me.  I had a difficult time removing the cartridge from the Linn tone arm and was concerned about damage I might cause putting the "new" cartridge back in.  I brought it to Andy and he did it for me.  I can't recommend Andy enough.  

I just received back the Benz Ebony L I sent to Andy.  It was back within a week after I sent it including two cross country trips.  It sounds better than before and the price was quite reasonable.  Fantastic service from Andy!

I have used Andy's service twice.  The first was retipping my Accuphase AC3 in 2018 with micro ridge nude diamond.  The second time is my Highphonic MC-A6 last week with same type of tip/cantilever.  Both cartridges show sound improvements over the original, very fine high end and in great detail.  

I highly recommend Andy to everyone for cartridge repair/retip.

Frank

I just had my Winfield cart retipped by Soundsmith.  Quick turn around, excellent sound. 

I recently had my Ortofon Bronze retipped by Andy. Everything about the experience was outstanding. Amazing quick turnaround and the cart sounds phenomenal. 

I damaged the stylus on my Dyna 20XXL. Andy replaced the damaged stock stylus with a new microridge-that was 4 years ago and its still sounding better than the original on my Amadeus Mk2. The replacement made a positive impact on detail and even more so on channel separation. He completed the work quickly and communicated well throughout  the process. Highly recommended. The community is lucky to have Andy as a resource. 

Just had Andy repair my Rega Apheta 3. He re-tipped it with a micro ridge nude stylus boron. Sounds fantastic - a significant upgrade over how it sounded before. He also did the repair in record time and was great to work with. I highly recommend him.

Kim did subpar work on a cart for me, and when I sent a photo showing an obviously crooked cantilever he responded with a ridiculous word salad instead of just saying what he should have said" "I'm sorry. Send it back and I'll make it right." After a bit of back and forth I decided to send it elsewhere because I was getting a real strong vibe that he was going to spit into my soup, if you know what I mean.

Based on everything I've read about Kim, on Audiogon and elsewhere, your odds of getting a job well done are pretty good, but there's also a chance you'll get hosed.

The work I've had done by Soundsmith, VAS and Joseph Long was all done correctly the first time.

I purchased a  modified/retipped Denon 103 cartridge from Andy this July and I'm extremely happy with both the sound and the experience. Andy was great to deal with and my system sounds the best it ever has. 

Thanks Andy 

@viridian...lol!  Took me sec to get it, but that's clever! 

i acquired a Hana ML last year during a sale and was very happy with it. unfortunately during a recent visit by a friend, we had an accident and the cantilever became bent/askew.

i contacted Andy at Needle Clinic and he was very quick to respond. he was about to embark on travel, but provided me exact dates and was even willing to accommodate me before he left for his trip if i expedited shipping to him.

not being in a hurry as i had a back up cart (a NOS Denon 103 LCII), i was okay waiting for him to return. i shopped out a couple of days before he returned, so he received it when he came back. within a day or so of his receiving it, he wrote to me that the cat was all set and ready to ship. he had replaced the bent cantilever with a micro ridge nude stylus boron cantilever. the entire process from me shipping it out to receiving it back took about 9 days (i have waited months and months for Soundsmith back in the day to do this).

upon receipt, i mounted it on my rig and immediately notice greater detail and depth - a more pronounced sound stage. i’m sure it can only get better as it gets broken in.

highly recommend Andy Kim at Needle Clinic.

I’m pleased to report an amazing experience with Andy Kim at Needle Clinic. Andy replaced the bent cantilever on my 6 month old Hana ML with a boron/mircro ridge. 

He replied immediately to my email with a price quote, and he did the repair on the same day he received the cartridge - December 24. He communicated very well and shipped it back to me the same day.  I would have had it on December 26 if someone had been home to sign for the package.  I picked it up at the post office on December 27 and it’s now back in its rightful place on my Rega P8. 
 

It sounds fantastic. Andy claims it sounds as good or better as the $2,500 Unami Blue, which makes sense because the Blue has the same engine and a boron cantilever/micro line stylus. Only the outer case should be different with this ML mod.  It sounds more detailed than I remember the ML. It was a bit jarring at first but I’m getting used to it and just loving the depth, soundstage and instrument separation. 
 

This was an A+ experience. Thank you Andy!

Equipment:

Rega P8

Hana ML modded with boron/MR stylus by Needle Clinic

ifi iPhono3 Black phono stage

Akitika PR-102 Preamp

Akitika GT-104 Amp

Emotiva T1+ speakers/Hifiman Arya Stealth headphones

I've had my Grado Opus3 wood body cartridge for about 2.5 years now--a bit of a splurge at the time at $275, but money well spent!  Since then, I've put over 1000 hours on the stylus.  It still sounded as good as the day I released it from its expertly crafted wooden box, but thought it was time for a new stylus just to be safe to not damage my vinyl and to possibly improve the sound.

After searching for options, I went with Andy Kim.  I live just a few hours north of his location.  That and his reported quick turnaround time made it an easy decision.  After some emails with Andy, I went with the top-of-the-line, boron/microridge option.  Andy's fast service is no joke--the cartridge arrived at his place in a couple days, and he emailed me that night that it was done.  Shipping plus the repair took about a week.

My system is very modest right now, running the Grado on a Fluance RT81 (soon to possibly be a Dual 1229 once it's repaired and there is no hum) into a Schiit Mani 2 preamp, to a Monoprice hybrid tube amp and ending with a pair of Original Advent Loudspeakers.  

The upgrade has opened up the top end of the music spectrum.  The original Opus3 was no slouch, but I hear a much more airy and open sound, along with incredible mids and bass.  The noise floor is much lower, and tracking is phenomenal.  Tracks on the inner groove that got a bit rough are smooth and clear.  I'm using the Löfgren B arc protractor and have an LP Gear head shell that lets me adjust azimuth.  I'm sure I'll need to tweak it a bit as I listen more, but it is sounding amazing right now with just a few hours of listening time.  I'm sure some more break in time will continue to open up the sound.

All in all, a very successful upgrade, both for the sonic results and the experience Andy Kim offered.  If you have an Opus3 and the means to do so, I fully recommend getting this upgrade.  So far, I do not regret it!

Let me be the first 2025 contributor to this thread.  Many years ago I got a used AQ 7000 cartridge. I ran it sparingly for a few years but it was just not performing well so in 2018 I sent It to Andy for service.  Andy reported back that the cartridge had been serviced before as there was much extra epoxy which had gotten into the coil assembly and over one of the screws attaching the body cover.  He was able to remove the epoxy and rebuild the cartridge.  I was so impressed with the result.  The performance was on the mellow side vs. the highly resolving Clearaudio Accurate I was also using.  The frequency extremes had good coverage but the smoothness of the mids was something that kept me wanting to continue with the AQ, so much so that I ran this cartridge almost exclusively for 5+ years when it finally was showing signs of needing attention as by then it had 2000 or so hours of use.

In late 2023, I got a great deal on a Shelter Harmony in Japan.  This replaced the AQ on the Shroeder Ref SQ arm.  The Shelter was more bold, dynamic and detailed.  I liked this a lot but I missed the midrange smoothness of the AQ.  Andy had told me that the rebuilt AQ was much like a top Koetsu.  I kept this in mind as I acquired a used Koetsu Onyx long body during the time I was playing the AQ.  I knew the Koetsu was in need of service but the Shelter was sounding so good that I kept the Koetsu on the sidelines.

I then installed a second arm, a Shroeder LT, and moved the Shelter to that.  It takes about 10 minutes to move a cartridge between the two Shroeder arms as they both use the same cartridge mounting plate.  The LT arm showed me just what the Shelter was truly about, greater bass extension, much more energy on top, and greater body to instruments and vocals.  But still, the AQ’s mid smoothness was not quite there.  I realized what a killer bargain at $650 for Andy’s AQ service for all those years considering the amount of cleaning and repair to be done before applying the new cantilever and stylus.

The next logical step was to get the Koetsu serviced.  I had a Koetsu Rosewood Signature years ago when the Clearaudio Accurate was my primary cartridge.  I just could not get into the Koetsu RWS.  Where was the bottom octave?  Where were the top two octaves?  The mids sounded glorious but without all the rest that the Clearaudio was bringing to the table, the RWS did nothing for me so I passed it on.  Perhaps it was an incompatibility of the Graham 2.2 or Zeta arms at the time.  I had read much about the Koetsu stone bodies being a very different presentation so all these years later, it was time to try.

For many years, the consensus in these forums for Koetsu service was to only have Koetsu do this.  But this is no longer an option.  There has also been much praise for the retip service in France and VAS for Koetsu service.  But I decided to buck the system and work again with Andy.  I sent him the Koetsu, the Clearaudio and a long time favorite, a Shinon Red, which got much random play time over the years.  The Shinon’s structure was just barely above the LP during playback so I knew it needed attention as well.

I greatly appreciated Andy’s honesty when he told me that he could bring some life back to the Clearaudio, but he felt it was time to retire this.  He was able to fix the Shinon (stylus and tube) and the Koetsu (new stylus and recondition the suspension).  It was 8 days from time that I shipped to him and got everything back.

One last listen to the Shelter in the LT arm.  Then it got moved to the Ref arm.  Installed the Koetsu into the LT arm.  I expected mediocre performance as I read that new cartridges need some break-in time.  But the Shelter was outstanding right out of the box in late 2023.  Well, so was the Koetsu!  I expected compromised frequency extremes.  This was not the case.  This cartridge locked in with the LT arm.  The bass was incredible.  Outstanding detail and harmonics in the upper frequencies.  But, it was the mid smoothness that impressed me so much.  Once you hear all this harmonic structure compared to other very good cartridges, it’s tough to go back.  I remember having a similar experience with the first Shinon I got in the mid 1980s.  The Koetsu Onyx reminded me of the rebuilt AQ 7000’s magic but with so much more life and dynamics that I like about the Shelter.  I have played 11 LPs in the last 3 nights since I installed the Koetsu.

For all those that say, if it’s not done by Koetsu, it’s no longer a Koetsu, well, I could not care less!  What this does in the Shroeder LT arm is nothing less than spectacular.  As for thinking about this action making this Koetsu not re-sellable, or at a loss, again, I could not care less.  I never experienced phono playback like this so it’s staying with me until the end.  All the praise of this cartridge, all the way back to the early 80s, is what I am now experiencing, and, in a vastly superior phono playback than what existed back then.  As the Zanden 1200 phono stage does not have adjustable loading provision, I will play the Koetsu for a month or so and then I can try loading it, maybe start with 10K and see how that sounds and tweak or not accordingly.

Kudos to Andy for bringing this legendary cartridge back to life in just a week’s time.  Very happy customer here.

John

My housekeeper pulled the cantilevers out of two cartridges:  a Cardas Myrtle and a ZuAudio. Andy said they would they would sound better when I received them back from him.  I was skeptical; he was right. Very quick turnaround.