Recommended loading for Benz Micro Glider L2

I found the L2 Woodbody to work fine into a 1:10 SUT feeding a 47K load. This is effectively a 470 ohm load on the cartridge. If I were using the L2 directly into a preamp, I would start with 470 or 500 ohms.

I have the Benz Glider M2. I have experimented at length with loading using a Phenomena phono preamp. The sound started to change substantially below 2K. However the best sound on a very wide variety of material was at about 670 ohms. This gives a lot of detail without killing the body of the music. Remember that the VTA and playing weight have a FAR greater effect on the sound. The arm is level in my setup. Playing weight is 1.8 grams.

Thanks, guys. I assume that the default loading is 47K and I have tried to find specs/info on the Musical Surroundings web site, to no avail. I guess I didn't search hard enough. I think that this pre-amp uses plug in resistors that insert into a pair of RCA jacks adjacent to the phono input. The manual is not terribly thorough- I guess I will have to contact CAT next week.

Swamp - I have the M2 Glider, and found I prefer it loaded just below 400 ohms (I was able to easily try out a wide range of values with my phonostage). Presumably, that would mean if I had an L2, I would load it down even lower - since your cart outputs less than half the voltage of mine, I suppose I would start off around 150-200 ohms and see what's what. I don't know what the CAT's default loading is, but if it's 47K ohms, I wouldn't be at all surprised if this made the sound rather diffuse and lacking in "snap", as you put it. (Just as a reference, the Musical Surroundings website lists the loading range for the L2 as >120 ohms, and for the M2 as >200 ohms.) Of course, my results can't be viewed as gospel - each set-up and listener are different - but I can tell you it's well worth experimenting with if you can.

i like 10k-ish region of impedance for benz.

if you don't have any array of resistances first open the box and see if someone already soldered load resistances and determine a value.

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i'd figure that you have an originally installed 47k (for MM)resistors at phono input and all you should do is to determine a resistor that you want to plug-in.
If you go with 10k resistor your resulting load resistance will be approximately 9k but if you go with another 47k resistor your resulting load resistance will be 28.5k.
follow the formula of two resistors connected in-parallel:

Ro = 47k*Rs\46k+Rs

Where Ro is resulting resistance and Rs is the one you select for your experiment.

If you realy want to test by-ears you should arrange a bread-board and thread-out an aligator clips or test plugs so you can change the load resistance on-the-flight.

FYI
Please note that resulting resistance of two resistors in parallel will result smaller resistance of the smallest among two. If one resistance is infinitessimally small and another resistance is infinitessimally large in comparison to each other than you can approximate the result resistance simply by the smallest one. For example you can easily assume that if you will need to load only with 50 Ohms having 47k resistor in-parallel than you can simply assume that by applying 50Ohm resistor you will get almost 50Ohm.