The same thing has happened to me! Clumsy fingers! If you see no damage to the cantilever you should be good to go! |
They do tend to bounce when an accident happens. :(
It’s a horrible feeling and you have my sympathy.
Looking on the bright side, from what you describe, if you can still hear both channels as normal, then I doubt that any significant harm has been done.
This has happened to me on 2 occasions. Once by my own clumsiness when it bounced across a record during setup. The second was when a 4-year old (not even mine - the next door neighbours) ran headlong (with my daughter in pursuit) into the turntable knocking it backwards off the stand and causing the unsecured tonearm to fall and bounce. It was like a train crash in slow-motion. The cantilever ended up wedged in a small gap between the arm board and the top plate. “Ugh” is definitely the word.
The turntable was lifted back onto the table before I realised where the cantilever had parked itself.
All those years that my daughter respected the hi-if only to be undone by an outside force. :( |
Just Twice? Shoot, I've been doing this since 1958 and I can't count how many times a tone arm has gotten away from me. Happened just the other day and with a Clearaudio Da Vinci no less. I've never had a cartridge damaged by this. It just looks a whole lot worse than it actually is. Keep on spinning:-) |
Dropping the arm should not have damaged the cartridge. The sideways swipe might be more of an issue, but, if it sounds okay, you are probably fine. Under normal circumstances I don't see how this should ever happen. My operation is simple, I always leave the arm cued up. The only time I cue down is to play the record. I never rely on the arm being on the rest. |
Thanks for the replies, I feel a bit better about it. And yes Larry, I usually do the same (leave tonearm lift up) but I must have forgotten this one time and of course that’s all it takes is that one time. And Moonglum, that is too bad! I got children as well but they respect my hifi and do not go near it, its me that I have to worry about🙄....lol. I will be replacing this blue point with the Hana El just ordered from music direct anyhow... but the blue point only has maybe 40 hours total on it...I will either sell it or just put it away for some other day. I own the pro-ject the classic sb superpack turntable with carbon fiber/aluminum tonearm and I’m hoping the low output Hana can improve things just a bit. I’ve read nothing but great things concerning the Hana el....I’ll be using a musical fidelity lx lps with loading plugs, possibly try the 500 ohm plug to start out as the hana requires 400 ohms or greater. The musical fidelity phono Preamp is pretty unique in that it came with 5 loading plugs. I only paid $250 (retail $299) for it. The lx2 lps, essentially the same preamp, got 5 stars in what hifi. I’m currently using a Graham slee amp2 se, but I find it lacking on some records. |
I did that once. Thankfully it was someone else's turntable. |
Sounds like you dodged a bullet...if you tinker around with the system accidents will happen. But that’s what makes it fun. Carry on!
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Yes I believe I lucked out. The cantilever looks perfectly straight and the diamond stylish appears perpendicular to the record groove, looking at it through a magnifying glass. I played a couple of records and they seemingly sound fine. I guess I keep on truckin' lol..... |
Has anyone had a record slip through your fingers while flipping it over and have it slide like a frisbee passing the back of the turntable and sliding all the way down the back of the cabinet?
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Mijostyn, LOL!
I guess I’m just naturally careful - especially where such mishaps have a severely adverse effect on my wallet!
PTSD doesn’t begin to describe it. :D :D
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Audioguy,
Mercifully the last incident was quite a while ago so I’m well into recovery ;) :D :D
Captain Winter,
This is the principle in which a dropped sandwich always falls jam face down on the kitchen floor. As a complication, they always fall to the most inaccessible place ;D
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You should be thankful the platter wasn't spinning. Bouncing across something soft where the diamond can dig in would have tore the cantilever right out of the cartridge. I had a loose fitting T-shirt on and bent over my turntable to see the back side. When I stood up straight, I felt a small "tug" on my shirt. I looked down at the cartridge cantilever and it was bent at a 45 degree angle out from the cartridge. Just destroyed a $600 cartridge at the time. Not happy. You should be thankful everything is ok. |
Moonglum, that's funny! Yes a sandwich as well as a slice of pizza hahaha. Mr_m that's aweful! Yea I guess I will be thankful...it could be worse..... |
If it sounds OK it more than likely is OK - looks like you got lucky! We all need a support group anyways. |
Agreed, I need help, lol! I will buy a piece of equipment or a record before food🙄 |
Have given an arm and cart a ride a few times, just the most recent one, about a year ago, needed to be sent to Soundsmith for a suspension adjustment and it was probably because of the gross weight of the DRT XV1s in question. As a rule I always leave the cue up when arm is resting unless someone can speak of why not to do this I will continue this protocal. Good to hear that you dodged the audio gremlins. Enjoy the music.
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Look closely at your arm lift. Many are adjustable, both for vertical height as well as horizontally, where they start lifting and where they allow the arm to go lower into the arm rest.
What you want to do is adjust the lift so it will lower onto a record but not quite enough to go all the way to the platter. Perfect.
As a bonus your arm will now be higher when raised than before, giving you more time to get to your seat and be ready. Perfect! |
Forgeddaboudit.
Although this is a good excuse to replace that Sumiko. |
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Wow I learned a lot from the above. Sorry about your collective losses of cartridges, hair, and sleep. I will make sure I have a rubber band and some gaffer tape near my turntable going forward! Thanks. |
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had the Delos get away from me the lther day on the hyper low friction Tri-Planer and Lady Luck smiled as I had cueing lever up !!!!!
that would have been a difficult conversation with The War Department so close to tax time.....
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Has anyone had an LP miss the center spindle while the platter is turning? The LP is half off the turntable and flying around like an out of control weedeater. That could take a cantilever out for good. Ive always managed to catch mine in time! |
That's nothing. I once played the platter mat thinking it was a David Byrne album.
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Wanna see something reeeeeally scary? Put a Koetsu Rosewood in a Transcriptors Vestigial tonearm and watch it pogo back and forth across the record at 30 Hz. |
If you really want to be certain send it to Soundsmith to be examined and aligned if necessary. Soundsmith has the best cartridge repair service in the USA. Also I will not buy a cartridge from a company that cannot fix a problem like yours quickly and
inexpensively. Almost all styli need realignment from time to time anyway.
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browndt... Almost all styli need realignment from time to time anyway ... Will you please tell us what cartridges you've owned that led you to this conclusion? What kind of pickup arm did you have them installed in?
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I whacked the tonearm once off to the side of the rest with the cue lever down.... the stylus hit the edge of the record, then bounced in towards the label. Nice going. It bent the beryllium cantilever off center about 2 degrees. I played it and everything sounded as good as usual, but it disturbed me that the diamond was not tracking as it should per specification.
I called Peter at Soundsmith, he told me don't try to fix something which is not broken as it's still playing. The best way to deal with it would be to twist the cartridge body slightly of axis so that the cantilever would be tracking straight in the grooves. I thought this was a great idea, but the better choice would be to just replace the stylus, which I did. I keep the 'bent' one in stock as a just in case back up.
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Just to make your feel better...
i had saved for a long time to buy a big upgrade in my turntable - found a Transrotor Fat Bob S and the owner “threw in” a brand new Benz Micro Ebony cartridge for very little money. That cartridge was a far better cartridge than I could normally afford so I was very chuffed. Had to spend at least a month constructing a new rack space and isolation platform until I could finally even set it up. Just before I left on a vacation, the night before, I got my first brief listen to the new set up and was in heaven.
Came home from vacation all ready to have some real time with the new vinyl rig, went to put on a record and...noticed the cartridge was now hanging off the arm at some crazy odd angle!! What the possible f#ck????
How??? Why???
Turned out the cleaning lady had made a visit while we were gone.
I talked to her and she said, yeah she was cleaning around that big new shiny thing, reached over and heard a “big bang” then noticed “that skinny silver part was hanging off now.” Of course a cloth she was carrying had hooked on the end of the arm whipping it off and dislodging the cartridge.
You wanna talk heartbreak!
All said and done, fortunately the cartridge seemed to have survived. The arm..not as much.
As anyone with a nice turntable knows, cleaning staff are The Antichrist to turntables.
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