I have been using these ET2's for over 9 years now. I am still figuring them out and learning from them. They can be modified in so many ways. Bruce Thigpen laid down the GENIUS behind this tonearm over 20 years ago. Some of you have owned them for over 20 years !
Tell us your secrets.
New owners – what questions do you have ?
We may even be able to coax Bruce to post here. :^)
There are so many modifications that can be done.
Dressing of the wire with this arm is critical to get optimum sonics along with proper counterweight setup.
Let me start it off.
Please tell us what you have found to be the best wire for the ET-2 tonearm ? One that is pliable/doesn’t crink or curl. Whats the best way of dressing it so it doesn’t impact the arm. Through the spindle - Over the manifold - Below manifold ? What have you come up with ?
Really cool speakers and kit. Congrats Whenever I put my own time and skills into building and modding components there is always a tendency to want to keep, hang on to those components. There is a pride element with the B&W Electrostatic Speakers I restored last year. I have real problems with speakers. Tonearms are easy there is only one. 8^0 Speakers are like boats to me. Never met a speaker I didn’t like, and could not make work in a room, given freedom in the room. If I stay in a room long enough a system usually ends up in there and speakers take up the most space. Your speaker design is very attractive from this point of view. Case in point, I am having a hell of a time trying to sell some custom Acoustat Model 3’s. I have multiple rooms, multiple speakers, and I am going to one large room. Not really an environment to have people audition the sale of speakers. 8^0 And the records ? I tried trimming some by offering lots for sale. From an interest point of view, one would think I was selling some disease. Unless the records are rock, pop, funk, punk, metal..... Cheers Chris
Hello all, Long time away. I’m about to wander off topic again. Awhile back I picked up a Denon DL-103M cartridge which I understand many consider the best of the 103 series. In any event I wasted no time shipping it out to Andy Kim at the Record Doctor. Andy installed his recommended “upgrade” which I believe was boron cantilever and hyper elliptical stylus. When I got it back I thought it sounded quite “nice” on the VPI, ET-2 and Garrard 301, Ortofon rigs but nothing to really crow about. Well, recently I was given a Denon DP-61f turntable in impeccable condition. (Yep, that’s right, a mid-fi, fully automatic table with adjustable Q no less.). In short order I installed the Denon cartridge and sat back prepared to hear some nice mid-fi music. Wow, was I surprised. I’m not sure what’s causing it unless it is just a great symmetry between a Denon table and a Denon cartridge but it is giving my much more expensive rigs a run for their money. Lots of prat, quite detailed but not harsh and extended on both ends. A fun
Considering taking the plunge on a London Decca Super Gold for my ET-2. Was there a consensus about the viability of the current version (SG3) using them with the stock ET-2 aluminum wand tonearm without having a dampening trough?
I'm generally playing VG to VG+ used jazz, country and soul records. Not beaters, but definitely not pristine audiophile records. My current Nagaoka MP-110 (which I guess is known as a slightly above average tracker?) tracks just fine.
I also don’t have the ET-provided cartridge alignment card. Given how low the cartridge body rides how hard is it to get the cartridge alignment set? I currently use an old record that I’ve etched aline down from the spindle hole to the outer edge as a guide and it’s difficult to set with my old eyes.
@ct0517 Agreed Chris - when you build/modify your own DIY equipment, it is personal and relinquishing that equipment is harder. I essentially reached the end of my stereo DIY building...as well as reached the end of working on muscle cars 12 years ago. I am almost done running my final ham radio antenna experiments.
I think the key is knowing you can always do more upgrades, builds and experiments, but you have to determine the point at which "you" want to stop; more so if you are still curious about orthogonal areas that require learning something completely new - which takes time to be competent. You end up trading off time and where you want to spend it...tradeoffs.
I sold off all my automotive tools and parts (engine crane, ignition analyzers, pullers, carbs, cams, etc) for restoration work. That first "release" was hard to let go. I subsequently sold off my duplicate voltmeters, oscilloscopes, signal generators for DIY stereo and ham radio builds (just kept one scope, one volt ohm and one Weller soldering workstation for future repairs). Selling off this gear / parts was much easier after letting go of my automotive gear and parts. I recently sold off my duplicate stereo gear (no second room gear or backup gear or parts...except spare vacuum tubes) - no sentiment experienced.
I will probably continue practicing piano and playing recitals for another 10 to 15 years and call that quits. Maybe I will pickup painting...
I am looking for help. So thanks for taking the time to read.
I am trying to get my 30 yr old Oracle / ET arm working again. The first thing I did was take the table to the local Audio store. They took a look at it and did not give me confidence that it was worth fixing. Somewhere between transporting the table to the store and taking it back the swing of the tone arm has been significantly lowered. The link below are pictures of the ET https://photos.app.goo.gl/bbQALFNotPbF9Jec8 You can see that the two positions of the tone are are well below the platter. It was not like that before. My guess is that the support that holds the cueing lever in place slipped down. But I do not see any indication of that happening. I know that this is a sensitive installation, it was working fine 20 years ago and I don't want to cause any additional problems. Also any thoughts on the best way to start up using again. I have replaced the large filter that was inline and the aquarium like pump seems to be operational. I did a basic cleaning of the arm and started up the pump to see if all was working. It seemed to go smooth. But I have not tested it on a record. I may have real issues with the Oracle motor.
If I understand your issue correctly it looks as if the cueing support has been turned which causes the armwand to rest lower at the cartridge end. Some of your pictures show that support in a different position. Just turn it until you obtained your desired resting position.
I would read through the ET manual to get re-acquainted with the setup and maintenance again. Page 25 of the manual shows how you can adjust the cuing mechanism. It almost looks like your cuing got reversed: lever up -> cartridge down. ET website has a link to download PDF manual if you don't still have it.
Yes - I had rf issues with van den hul solid core silver. Going back to copper litz fixed the problem ( and sounded better )
If you have the original wiring loom poor connections can be a source of rf - go through and clean all joints and resolder any dodgy looking soldered joints and check cartridge pin connections are nice and firm.
Failing that make sure that the wiring for each channel are a twisted pair - gently winding into a twisted pair +ve and -ve wires will help with the avoidance of rf.
Been a really...long time. Life has a way of throwing curve balls even when you think you have planned for changes. We moved house after many (many) years and it has been one challenge after another. Hope this post finds everyone well.
Recently found out that Bruce continues to be active and provides support for all his products. IMO - The best test of products is the test of time.
Good to see your post, Chris. Coincidentally, just yesterday (and a couple of times prior) I thought to pm you to say hello and to see how you are doing, but one of life’s mini curve balls side tracked me. Hope things are more settled for you now in your new home. Best wishes.
I'm not sure if this has been mentioned, but I just weighed the aluminum and magnesium arm wands. Both had foam damping material inside of them. The aluminum wand was 8.83g and the magnesium wand was 24.24g.
Thats why I still run the aluminium arm tube with heat shrink and internal damping removed - keeps the horizontal mass as low as possible and less smear with the h/s & foam removed.
Hi Guys - so I conversed with Bruce this past week on this topic.The conversation is attached below. My personal experience is this.
Anyone into vinyl seriously who sets up their own rigs could probably become a physics major. All the considerations for vibrations and resonances in the room, and they start with that cartridge wiggling in the groove generating a signal. It doesn't get more analog//mechanical than that. Everyone on this analog forum knows by now, that Linear Tracking guys are a certain type of personality. We are not happy that a pivot tonearm can only track properly at two points on a record, we hate anti skate like cancer; however many of us have secondary setups (we call them secondary) and they include pivot tonearms. But we have (actually) heard the differences between them, and when set up properly you can't beat the resolution of ET2, 2.5. Clean sounding records start to finish.
Regarding the recent discussions, I have been using a Mag wand for a long time now with no detriment to the cartridge. My personal experiences is concerns over the added weight are negligible and what is more important - is proper setup and matching high and low compliance carts to their better wands. Aluminum - High Compliance Carts , Mag - Low Compliance Carts. Many have personally modded the aluminum wands to meet their needs. It's all good
I attach discussions with Bruce this week on the topic.
************************************************************************ Hi Bruce
>
> A question from someone.
> They are worried about the heavier mag wand over the aluminum in
> regards to the cartridge cantilever stress, since all records are not
> perfectly round. They think the cart will sway more back and forth
> more with the Mag wand causing cantilever stress.
> The owners manual is clear not to play records that are badly out of round.
>
> Can you provide me with an explanation regarding the forces at play.
> I understand how the aluminum wand works better with high compliance
> carts, and vice versa low compliance carts for the magnesium wand.
> Thanks Chris
Chris,
The untold parameter of a pivoted tonearm: To minimize tracking
error, pivoted tonearms were lengthened with a bend in the wand, or by
mounting the stylus at an angle in the headshell. The frictional force
of the stylus in the groove wants to straighten out the bend or crawl up
the records inner groove wall. When using anti skating with a pivoted
tonearm to prevent inner groove wear, regardless of mass, pivoted
tonearms bend the stylus with an opposite side load force of between .1
and .2 grams per gram of tracking force, the tonearm shaft is being
twisted outward (as viewed from above) with this static load which goes
through the stylus suspension, but the percentage of creep on the inner
wall of the record groove actually varies with the passage loudness or %
groove modulation. So you are constantly bending the stylus while only
marginally solving the problem.
With the ET-2 the side loads to accelerate the tonearm at .55hz
(33/13 RPM) are less than half of those values for an eccentricity of
.0312 inches (1/32 inch) and are a linear function of record
eccentricity. The cartridge cantilever suspension sees much lower loads.
So as you add mass, this side load value of the ET-2 goes up
linearly, but is always less than using any pivoted tonearm with anti
skating.
And remember the ET 2.0 and 2.5 are unique in design unlike any other linear tracker. This has been covered in length on this thread. The numbers Bruce refers to were actually tested by him in a lab and apply only to his tonearm.
My reasoning for weighing the magnesium and aluminum arm wands is that I just removed my aluminum arm wand to install a magnesium arm wand. The heavier magnesium arm wand should be a better match for my low compliance cartridge.
Does anyone know what kind of adhesive is used to attach the metal leaf spring to the I beam?
Are you using the newer long I Beam ?
Recommend anyone using the original short I Beam get Bruce to send you (single and double) leaf spring long I Beams. They reduce the counterweight requirement by half, and increase vertical inertia.
@ct0517I'm sure it's somewhere buried in this thread, but how long is the long I-beam? I have one that's 60mm and one that's 70mm. Is there one that's longer than 70mm?
yes - the longer one cut the counter weight requirement in half. So it must be around double the length of the original one. I am not looking at one right now. If you click on my virtual system you will see it.
I like disputes. Here is my ''first.''. This thread looks like Wittgenstein's ''phylosophical remarks'' He made about 10000 while an ''normal human'' can remember about 10. Keep inventing new upgrades...
Congratulations on your purchase, dentdog Fantastic tonearm! And welcome to the thread. With the exception of an occasional and thankfully rare bit of noise (like an annoying click or pop from a favorite lp) it is one of the most civilized and friendliest threads on Audiogon with a wealth of useful info on the setup and use of the great ET2. Keep us posted.
I like disputes. Here is my ''first.''. This thread looks like Wittgenstein's ''phylosophical remarks'' He made about 10000 while an ''normal human'' can remember about 10. Keep inventing new upgrades...
If you want to do a case study in irrational logic and thinking read the posts from richardkrebs earlier in this thread - he argued for the best part of 12 months that adding 30g of lead to the ET2 was a good thing, presented fantastically illogical arguments and analogies for well over 6 months, almost daily. Anyone who disagreed with him was wrong. Eventually after about 18 months ( from memory ) he disclosed that he never added 30g of lead mass. ( or so he claimed ).
Most ET2 Users use the ET2 supplied pump, it makes very little noise cannot be heard from 6 feet away and is placed on the floor next to the turntable.
When you order a car you have options. You can select a bigger engine, you can select more horsepower from the same engine. Bruce offers this bigger engine as the 2.5. And he can modify the horsepower the smaller and larger engine make based on your needs. From approximately 3 PSI stock ET2 (base product) to 19 PSI. This applies to the ET2 and the ET2.5 which is the bigger engine with the bigger manifold. Every ET 2 or 2.5 was made for a certain amount of PSI in Bruce’ lab.
Public Chat Forums attract Aficionados in every hobby. Some of us here, represent the extreme end. Many of the discussions are about these mods and upgrades we have done. There are many modifications and upgrades that can be done and this is all possible because the design has few limits. I trust you and others have enjoyed these discussions.
Why Wittgenstein ? I would prefer Newton as what we are discussing here is basic physics. Think of your childhood teeter totter and trying to enjoy with a friend that was not the same weight as you. Do you remember the teeter totter and having to sit closer or further away from your friend in order to balance? The concept is the same here. The PSI gives us lift off, and we can fly sideways and pivot with no friction unlike other air bearing designs.
Does Slivovitz boost memory Nikola ? I can tell you that Scotch and Canadian Beer does not.
And one of the best arms ever made regardless of price and most unfairly maligned.
It beggars belief that on audiogon there is so much misinformation on the ET2, when discussing tonearms in general, when the Eminent Technology website contains more testing and test data to support the design and substantiate their claims on performance than any other tonearm on the market.
It's sad that there is much to learn on the ET website even if your preference is a conventional pivoted arm that folk just cant be bothered to take advantage of Bruces formidable knowledge.
Hi Nandric, one of my fondest memories is a FR 7 /FR 64 combo, the sound and solidity of which I see like carved out of rock. I also remember how low the horizontal resonant frequency was... fumbling around with tuning aspects of a tonearm is not to everyones taste. Neither is studying physical formulas - and even more difficult is to accept that some things work although they shouldn’t.
I exchanged posts and mails with Richard Krebs earlier on and I didn’t find his observations absurd in any way, rather I see them as a worthwile contribution to the knowledge base here, based on systematic experiments.
They (partly) fly in the face of mainstream analogue wisdom. Which BTW has been challenged more recently by the Moerch DP-8 which instead of staying proudly slim on horizontal mass, states big is beautiful (on the horizontal level...).
Rigidity with low resonance structure and high mass is helpful in more than one aspect, sometimes. The ET2 / ET2.5 is a triumph in making an air bearing linear tracker "compatible" with sprung subchassis tts. This triumph was made possible by rel. rigid low mass parts and by increasing the complexity of the horizontal mass combo by decoupling the counterweight. This is in many situations desirable (because tunable), is prerequisite for sprung tts, but it is not necessary for low compliance cartridges - in fact (what Richard is saying) eliminating the additional decoupling can in some cases improve the sound.
"His" arm looks like many highly regarded (also) superbly (but differently) engineered air bearing arms, but is based on the ET bearing. Although not for anyone, I like the inquiring spirit and the idea - even if it appears like heresy to moe. :-)
Let’s not forget, that the resonance frequency is changed less than 30% by adding 30g to a high hor. mass tonearm like the ET 2.5. Which, with most records. causes no problem. Increasing hor. mass with a linear tracker just increases the necessity of really good hor. balance adjustment and levelness of the platter.
Even if the adjustment procedure might look like a religious ritual... ;-) it’s very much worth it!
@nandric
Best that we stay on point here Nikola.
I don't follow any philosophers per se; my comment in the previous post was in jest. I do however believe anyone that survived the Covid Pandemic has the makings for being a great philosopher, especially if they are male and divorced. 8^0
Re: your reference to Dertonearm. He was very helpful when I was doing research on La Platine; but when I queried him on his ET2 setups I discovered that he went against the manual recommendations and added as much weight as possible, as close to the air bearing as possible. I also went there and tried that before talking to him. I found adding alot of weigh close to the air bearing, at some point you end up with one note bass and reduced vertical inertia. Adding enough weight can actually collapse the air bearing on that side. What I discovered was as little weight as far as possible out on the I Beam, produced near identical bass results to 15 IPS Tape and Good Digital.
Re;your Fr64s comments. Really well made tonearm in the this era of Chinese manufacturing. It resonates a lot however and produced too much bass in my room. So much so that I had to turn the sub settings down in that room, again compared to Tape, Digital and other tonearms in that room. I believe I read that J Carr had to put tape on his FR64s to tone these resonances down. But if its the only tonearm in a setup, one could obviously make adjustments to make it work well.
Cheers
@nandric
you cannot abbreviate the word methodology to the first 4 letters. you introduce spam. I have asked for it to be deleted along with the planted bogus user.
@dover
And one of the best arms ever made regardless of price and most unfairly maligned.
It beggars belief that on audiogon there is so much misinformation on the ET2, when discussing tonearms in general, when the Eminent Technology website contains more testing and test data to support the design and substantiate their claims on performance than any other tonearm on the market.
It’s sad that there is much to learn on the ET website even if your preference is a conventional pivoted arm that folk just cant be bothered to take advantage of Bruces formidable knowledge.
The ET2 was introduced in the same year as the Perfect Sound - CD. The magazine reviewers focus was on Digital.
So One - Bad timing and two - no reviews, that I have ever seen - past the basic setup not optimal and it was still reviewed really well.
One of the biggest mistakes the first time ET2 user makes is to use all the weights supplied on the I Beam, when what they should do is use only as many as needed to put them at the end of the Beam. But then, this is beyond basic setup however, and a more advanced setup.An understanding of physics comes into play. IMO if anything an Appendix could have been added to the manual to illustrate finer setup points. With a Pivot arm once you setup you are basically done. The ET2 invites many finer adjustments / upgrades as this thread shows.
The Audiophile equipment hobby is all about constant change. Others need numerous cartridges or tonearms to satisfy this need. ET2 folks need only make adjustments to setup to get better and better - same cartridge.
I normally don’t contribute to this thread, because I do not own and have never owned an ET2 or 2.5. However, I concede that it is probably a great tonearm. But when you speak of Newton, keep in mind that the net force exerted by a small weight at the end of a long lever That is required to balance a cartridge at a specific VTF will be the same as the force generated when you use a larger weight mounted closer to the pivot or fulcrum. Therefore I am wondering why mounting a large weight close to the pivot point makes any difference as far as overcoming the air pressure and collapsing the air suspension , Assuming the same VTF is thereby achieved in both cases.
I asked them to edit your post removing the spam link, and to delete the spam post and spam user. Audiogon chose to remove your post. You can post it again but don't use the first four letters only of the word methodology. Also no personal info about others.
This is a Public Chat Forum, very different from even a couple years ago, the internet is much more interconnected to FB-Meta, Google, Twitter, TicToc etc.... I spent 40 years in IT, much if it in Security. Don't take it personal.
I used to think that there is little that could really be learned and understood about an individual’s true sense of integrity and mettle from “conversations” on an Internet forum. I mostly still feel that way; but, there are, in fact, times when those things become very obvious in spite of the vagueness of the medium.
I am wondering why mounting a large weight close to the pivot point makes any difference as far as overcoming the air pressure and collapsing the air suspension ,
Because the air bearing carries the mass of the arm/cartridge/counterweight in total - If you have a larger counterweight that increases the total moving mass to above what the bearing has been designed for then it could collapse.
@nandric
From what I have read and understood, the removal of the post has only to do with eliminating the bot-trigger word "me.t..." to save the discussion thread being flooded with spam. Using this abbreviation is "logical" and understandable in verbal communication but it triggers the spam button on web-based discussion platforms.
Removal of that post had IMO nothing to do with something personal against you.
@ct0517 & @lewm
Using the same counterweight spring, to half the lever, ie. the distance of the counterweight from the pivot axis and to double the weight increases the resonance frequency of the counterweight-spring system (by SQR(2) methinks).
Ie. bass pulse / group delay aspects come into play too. With the decoupling the resonance system is more complex than without (nifty 4th order instead of 2nd order).
Increasing the weight of the assembly / counterweight increases the "weight stress" *and* the "leverage stress" on the air bearing. Optimally, in mid travel of the arm, the center of gravity of the whole arm should be centered in middle of the air bearing. (Something eg. the Kuzma, Air Tangent and adanalog arms are by design). A short i-beam / short lever severely shifts the center of gravity toward the end of the bearing and increases the leverage stress. Ie. the bearing works less stable.
I normally don’t contribute to this thread, because I do not own and have never owned an ET2 or 2.5. However, I concede that it is probably a great tonearm. But when you speak of Newton, keep in mind that the net force exerted by a small weight at the end of a long lever That is required to balance a cartridge at a specific VTF will be the same as the force generated when you use a larger weight mounted closer to the pivot or fulcrum. Therefore I am wondering why mounting a large weight close to the pivot point makes any difference as far as overcoming the air pressure and collapsing the air suspension , Assuming the same VTF is thereby achieved in both cases.
Lewm
Setting VTF on a pivot arm is two dimensional. With the ET 2, the mass is adjustable so you could call it a three dimensional setup. Did you know that the counterweights are decoupled by a spring, and that the cartridge itself only sees the vertical mass and not the horizontal mass ? The word "stressed" is a better word than "collapse" Many years ago I never did collapse it with extra DIY weights, but if I added even more weight who knows. The experiment was over before that.
Page 9 of the ET2 manual on design. Adjustable Effective Mass
The effective mass of the tonearm is adjustable, both vertically and horizontally. The arm has low-medium mass vertically and medium to high mass horizontally. Four counterweights allow the vertical / horizontal mass to be changed. For example; if the user decreases the amount of counterweights used, and moved this position back (higher scale number) the horizontal inertia of the tonearm would go down and the vertical inertia would go up.
You can download the ET2 manual here
http://www.eminent-tech.com/techsuppt.htm
If you read the first 10 pages of the manual and the tech section, I believe you will get a good understanding of the tonearm.
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