Fidelity Research cartridges

The Stevenson alignment is generally regarded - on this forum and almost anywhere else - as inferior to Baerwald. Measurements seem to bear this out.

So why did one of the most revered cartridge builders stick to this inferior alignment? We would have to assume that Ikeda tried out all options before making his choice. Or was compatibility with SPU types perhaps one of his design objectives (SPU’s exactly fit the Stevenson alignment with FR-64 tonearms)?

My guess is that Ikeda was not of the ’compromising kind’ and must have had ’sound’ reasons for choosing this alignment. Obviously it’s impossible to make a comparison of both alignments with the FR-7, but I did try it with other cartridges without fixed headshell (using the FR-64 with either 230 mm or 231,5 mm spindle-to-pivot distance).

This remark will probably disqualify me as a serious listener, but I don’t find the Baerward to be sonically superior to Stevenson. If anything, the Stevenson has an edge in dealing with inner groove distortion. This is particularly helpful with classical music, as these composer guys usually liked to ’go out with a bang’.

So this question remains: was Ikeda a Wagnerite?

@chakster I agree that the choices made by the tonearm/cartridge designer are the most important and should not be disregarded. The FR-7 have the Stevenson alignment as part of their design criteria and the sonic results speak for themselves.

@nandric I doubt if this choice has anything to do with Japanese culture. Various tonearm manufacturers chose their own alignment, using neither Baerwald nor Stevenson. Not just Sony, I know from experience that Pioneer and Audiocraft used their own alignments as well. So I'm not sure what national custom you're referring to. Innovation is impossible without deviation from the norm and I think we all agree that Ikeda was some innovator.

I've seen some heated debates on this forum about Stevenson versus Baerwald. The 'experts' all claim that Baerwald is way superior. So it seems that some people do hear something special when the 'o' points are set to Baerwald. I just don't.

Okay, sorry for my misunderstanding: "o" point taken!

There seems to be an interesting MC between his work for FR and starting Shelter. Apparently he released some cartridges under his own name somewhere in the 80's. I own the Ozawa OS-70L, which was part of a three model series with different cantilevers (aluminum, boron and ruby). This is one of those Japanese mystery MC's of which there's hardly any info. From what I've gathered these were built by Supex to Ozawa's specification. Fact or speculation I'm not sure, but it's a really nice sounding cartridge with more than a little resemblance to the Shelter 701, the first Shelter model. Coincidence?

This is somewhat speculative, but my guess is that most of these 1980’s cartridges were designed and ’voiced’ with the use of step up transformers, being more common than MC phono stages (called ’head amps’ in those days). And in Japan they were always more popular than active devices , even to this day.

Most of these vintage MC cartridges will sound great using a modern high quality phono stage, provided you have some flexibility for setting impedance load and gain. But in my experience the low output low impedance types - like most of the FR models - give their best using a dedicated SUT.

Would those three be the Ivory, MCA and Standard? 

I'd be interested to know if the cartridges Takeda built for other brands like Mark Levinson, Cello, Red Rose an Krell are identical to either of these three he produced under his own Miyabi banner.

I own the Mark Levinson MLC-1, which as far as I know was the first cartridge he made (at least of the ones mentioned here). It is a magnificent performer and certainly one of the most musical cartridges I've ever had the pleasure to hear. But I can't help wondering if any of the later models are even better. Did anyone here ever compare them?

Thanks for sharing your observations! I assumed these were all technically identical to the Miyabi Standard. But I did notice that  Krell had two different model numbers, which suggests there might have been some slight sonic differences. I also noticed that the shape of the body of the various Levinson brands is slightly different than the body of the Krell models and the Miyabi Standard. But I guess these were all just variations on the same theme. And what a theme......

As for other versions, I remember there was also one with a carbon fiber body made for Mobile Fidelity. I'd be curious to hear the influence of the different body material. One reviewer also mentions Klipsch as one of the incarnations, but this is incorrect.

I've seen pictures of the 47Labs model, but that's a rather ugly plastic job compared to the others. The rare Ivory on the other hand looks gorgeous. Apparently this was the first Miyabi model. 

Probably the closest one can get to the sound of the Miyabi Standard from a new cartridge is the Fuuga, a concious attempt to resurrect Takeda's creation.

Yes, it’s unforgivable to divert attention away from the FR-7, isn’t it? 😉

Getting back on the right - uh - track, changing the P2S distance of the FR-64S (or FX for that matter) when using the FR-7 is not a very good idea.

With P2S distance at 230mm you get perfect Stevenson alignment (the stylus ’hits’ all three ’o’ points on the Feickert protractor). This is clearly what Ikeda had intended. Changing to 231.5mm changes the geometry of the tonearm to Baerwald, but it will not be possible to align the FR-7 to this geometry. At least not according to the Feickert protractor. With the fixed headshell arrangement of the FR-7 there’s no way to adjust this.

I did try the Baerwald geometry with other (adjustable) cartridges, but I don’t hear the sonic benefits compared to Stevenson, so I decided to stick with Ikeda’s original specifications in all cases.

Dear Nandric,

Agnostic? Yes. Dogmatic? Hell no! But I do own 4 different FR-7 types, including the MC-702 which I regards as FR-7. I suppose this borders on ’religious’ or at least on being a strong believer. So I’m ’allowed’, thank goodness. 😋

On visual inspection the cantilever of the MC-702 doesn’t appear to be any shorter. This can be deceptive, but it is confirmed by the fact that it exactly hits the three ’o’ points of the Stevenson alignment on the Feickert protractor, just like the other three. I’m not at all suggesting Ikeda was ’dogmatic’, but he definitely was consistent.

As for that elusive Miyabi Ivory, I’ve actually seen it for sale twice this past years. Once on eBay by a Russian seller and once here on Audiogon by grgaudio, as part of a Miyabi ’wholesale’ with all the incarnations except the MoFi Carbon. I was outbid on eBay and the asking price of grgaudio was too steep for me at that time, but the Ivory is still on my radar......