I have been trying to tame the silblance and tracking distortion on my scout for quite a while. I have taken the same records played on a scout to a friends house. He has an old Mission table, a very good one. There was no sibilance tracking error and no inner groove distortion on his table at all. He brought over the same alignment tool he used on his table and tried his best to fix it. When he was finished, he said that is the best it will be. Still sibilance and inner groove distortion. He said the same thing that Audiofeil said. Get a better arm and that the arm is not good enough to get the best out of the Benz. I guess unipivots are tough to engineer and the only one he has heard that sounded good was the Graham Phantom. He told me to look into gimble arm such as a triplanar. I cannot see myself drilling my scout to put a triplanar or phantom on it even if i could afford it. My room is always over 70 degrees so I don't buy that argument. A moving magnet cartridge would probably track better on my table. Could it be just a matter of being maxed out, facing reality, plain and simple. Maybe I should try a Rega RB300 and see if the problem goes away. I guess it is a pretty good value. |
He mentioned the rega as it is pretty much a drop in and it is also widely accepted as a standard decent arm. He thought it might give me an idea on what is going on. I have the headshell weight and although it helped, the cartridge did not sound very good with it, to my ears at least. I have also tried the the antiskate and it did not sound as good as without. I have the Mint LP and my cartridge is definitely aligned as good as it will get. The frustrating thing is that it is sort of a teaser, the JMW tonearm allows me to get a taste of what the Benz is capable of, but will not allow the Benz to really shine. Does anyone know of a drop in replacement for the JMW 9. I am open to suggestions or is it just a matter of starting over. |
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Why doesn't VPI use a standard mounting? That I am curious of. Are they afraid their tonearm cannot compete with others? |
someone mentioned earlier of a standard mount, i do not know if that means an SME mount will work for more tonearms than just SME, Rega mount etc.
I just know my friend definitely knows what he is doing and he said the problem is most likely the arm and not the cartridge. WE tried anti skate and that was much worse. Adding the headshell weight deadened the sound.
I did not even know the mass of my JMW 9 as it is not listed anywhere. I cannot find the effective length and other information on this arm. Why isn't this sent with the table and arm? |
Another question is if some cartridges work with the JMW 9, why not list them somewhere so I don't waste $1,500.00 on a cartridge that is not compatible with the arm. Maybe I could have spent my money better elsewhere. Another question is why would a VPI dealer sell a cartridge that will not work well with a particular arm? That is not a very good VPI dealer, not good for VPI either. I would think VPI would want happy customers and not frustrated ones. |
I also cannot believe that the founder of VPI would call VPI owners and others chiming in on this thread morons. I have read numerous threads posted on the gon regarding JMW 9 tracking concerns, I am not the only one voicing concern. My cartridge is only a polite Benz, others have spent considerably more and are having similar issues. If I would have known this, i could have picked up and older used table, installed a Triplanar on it and been way ahead of the game. I could have put a 100 dollar cartidge on it and it would probably sound better than where I am at right now. |
He said morons plural, not necessarily directing it at you Robert but he just should not have said that. If that arm will only work best with MM cartridges, why not say something like MM cartridges recommended for the JMW 9, signature etc. It obviously has difficulty tracking with demanding cartridges. I think people should be aware of this so they do not make the same mistake as me. If you just plan on popping on a mm cartridge and listen occasionally, it probably is good enough for others. I just get ticked off when I take my sibilance and distortion ridden records to a friends house, and he plays them on a 30 year old turntable and they sound amazing, no distortion or sibilance. Why is that? He is using a Lyra cartridge as well. It tracks like a train on his table. If you were to see this table, it is not as nice to look at as a VPI, but it sounds great. I have never seen his table come up on the gon for sale. Its an old Mission 774 or something like that. |
That could be it, a mismatch, but a VPI dealer knowing what table I had sold me a cartridge that has no business being on that arm. I am just speaking about my situation. I have read that others have had problems with their cartridges even after being set up by VPI. I would think they would know how to align cartridges. I believe one of those instances is mentioned in this thread. Maybe it was a defective cartridges, or should I say cartridges. Who knows. |
Update. I recently realigned my cartridge. I do not believe it. My cartridge is tracking beautifully now. It is one of those, what happened? I have heard better, but it is certainly listenable right now. I think the biggest thing that I did was adjusting the VTA and azimuth. More the VTA though. It seems as though the Benz I have is very sensitive to VTA and only being off slightly is all the difference. I am very excited! Even though it is somewhat difficult to set up, it took me about a year, it is possible. I cannot believe it. Sounds great through the whole side, very little inner groove distortion and tracking error, big improvement. There is still some sibilance on some tracks, So Long So Wrong last track side two, but I believe this to be a recording glitch and just very demanding to track. Maybe a better cartridge or a MM cartridge could do a better job but I am not touching any of the settings. It seem together, the JMW 9 and Benz H2 are not very forgiving in setup. |
Let us know how the Sota works out. I am very interested in the outcome. |
So the pivot to spindle distance for the JMW 9 is 223mm?
I will check this |
I have the Benz Glider on my JMW9 right now and it sounds great. The thing I do not understand is that the motor assembly appears to be the same as the H2. I am starting to think my cartridge may be defective. I sent it to Musical Surroundings and they said they will take a look at it and give me some feedback this week. |
