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Diamond Stylus Enters the 4th Dimension

So, I went to play a Chet Baker Album last night. Lowered the arm, flipped og the mute switch and.......GARBAGE!

The cantilever looked fine. On examination with my USB microscope I confirmed a sullen fact. The diamond had gone AWOL. There is just a little glue left on the end of the cantilever which is completely undamaged. It is a Clearaudio Charisma cartridge.

Anyone ever have this happen? I played records the day before no problem. I did not take anything to the stylus brush or otherwise. I do use an Audio Technica tonearm lift but it's trigger mechanism is so light. I can't believe that did it and it certainly should not do it. IMHO the cantilever should break before the diamond gets knocked off. 

The cartridge is four months old and I got it from Elusive Disc. It has a two year warranty. Here is where the rubber hits the road. 
128x128mijostyn

Showing 2 responses by elliottbnewcombjr

elliottbnewcombjr
5,249 posts
 
Seems like a bad glue job, 4 months of vibrations shook it loose.  Nice it has a warranty, could have happened 1 month after warranty expired, like several of my Sony cameras!

A NUDE diamond is a whole miniature diamond, inserted or glued to the cantilever.

Some are a smaller diamond tip glued to the bottom of something that is itself inserted or glued to the cantilever. that’s two opportunities for glue to go wrong.


elliottbnewcombjr
5,249 posts
 
Dissolve Adhesive Story:

I have a Vintage Audio-Technica AT440ML, microline on aluminum.

Unused for 20 years (I preferred brush feature of Shure V15VxMR)

Recently revived it. The cantilever, and up into the body of the cartridge was FULL of black junk. FULL

I started with Stylus cleaner, got some junk out, but still a mess after several attempts.

I grabbed a can of spray Contact Cleaner, watched thru my shop magnifying light, it dissolved the junk off via it's chemical formulation and the spray force. Several rounds, spritz, wait, spritz. Cantilever still a black color, and surface 'rough' viewed magnified.

Finally, I saw the final layer of textured black 'skin' peel away from the aluminum cantilever. It seemed like spraying Brake Cleaner.

What have I done? Did I dissolve the suspension? Dissolve the adhesive? What did I have to lose?

Next, a play off against the Shure with new Jico SAS. Amazing, sounds great, it's on my Office Vertical TT, Mitsubishi LT-5V. Less dust up here.
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