New Kiseki blackheart cartridge not sounding right.


Just purchased a new kiseki blackheart today and upper frequencies are too pronounced. S’s are to much and sound smeared. Have about 2 hours on it. Any ideas what might be causing this?
mike
hiendmmoe
The parts , the wholes and the master. I noticed that the most
''new Kiseki'' are offered on the second hand sites. Similar to
van den Huls. The question is who put the parts together to
get the ''whole''? Obviously ''the master'' is involved such that
the master is more important than the parts. Say Ikeda, Takeda,
Lukatschek, van den Hul himself (or his employee). The question
who produced the original Kiseki's is still an mistery. But whomever
it was should be regarded as a real master. I own the original
Black heart and regard this one together with Agaat series in
the same league as Ikeda's and Takeda's. The market is not
always wrong (grin).
I would check your setup and loading on your phono stage a lot of moving coils like to be loaded down below 100 ohms to sound right.
"cantilever and stylus are so far underneath the body it makes trying set the overhang and horizontal tracking angle almost impossible. You just can’t see"

Looks to be the same arrangement as the PH/Blue.

I have terrible vision. A good light and magnification is all that's needed, along with patience. Adding .5 or so tracking force may help.
Thanks everyone. Biggest issue with the Kiseki is the cantilever and stylus are so far underneath the body it makes trying set the overhang and horizontal tracking angle almost impossible. You just can’t see it. I had to go from a Wally tracker to a GEO-Disc just to get it close. It’s sounding better but we will see.
Mike
Excessive sibilance can come from incorrect VTF, VTA, azimuth, antiskating. I assume that your tonearm bearings are in perfect shape.
Pronounced upper frequencies due to loading or wrong VTF and VTA.
Your cartridge is new, and assuming that your basic alignment is correct, run it some hours with full tracking weight and then recheck your settings.

Try all the excessive sibilance troubleshooting recommendations. If that fails, time to have it looked at by a shop, or someone who makes house calls.

I have a Blue and have been curious about the Blackheart That's a $4K cart-it better sound like one!

S’s are to much and sound smeared.


On all records? 

upper frequencies are too pronounced.

Change the loading

Double check the alignment, overhang, VTA, VTF, azimuth, etc.  Can you adjust the load of the preamp at all?  More burn in time is likely needed too.