Aloha all

well, i have been restoring a Dual 1209 that is in pretty much perfect condition. Had not been used since the mid 80's, and stored in a climate controlled room till it was given to me not too long ago.

the table had a shure, ah, m93e which was in rough shape, had corrosion on it, rust it appeared, but was just a mess.

having not discovered this site yet, i bought a grado black for it. did all the alignment, balancing, you name it. sounds great, but yah, it Hum's.

so, here is my question. I like the sound of the black, but do not want hum. any suggestions on a cartridge that mates well with the 1209?

I do not want to jump too high up just yet. I want to know why i want a better stylus, cartridge, etc. that is why i started low with the black. I want to be able to say, "yah i hear limitations in this, i need to improve".

well, thanks for anything you all come up with.

How about a Shelter 5000 (http://www.needledoctor.com/Shelter-5000-Phono-Cartridge?sc=2&category=877) - oh wait




I do not want to jump too high up just yet.

Seriously, welcome to AK!

You can rest assured that there's always room for improvement, so anything you choose as a next step up from the Grado Black will have its strengths and weaknesses.

What we need to start out with is a general budget, and, whether you want something around the performance level of the Black, or if you want to move up a bit. You and I have already briefly talked about this idea of going slowly, but at the same time you don't want to idle in the realm of low-end cartridges just for the sake of being able to hear a difference when you move up the cartridge ladder. My point is that you should never skimp on a cartridge, buy the best you can - perhaps look at something in the $80-$100 range, like one of the Ortofon 2M cartridges, or a AT440MLa - bearing in mind you're not going to find anything quite like the Grado; the Grado sound is somewhat unique.

But let us know your budget, and what you want, and then we can get more specific.


Dave

ok

lets say in the $80 to $140 range. i like a warmer but not colored and "mushy" (for lack of a better word) sound. I want to stray from a sterile sound, but want to hear what is on the record in a way that i was intended to hear it. I still want accuracy and tightness, but not harsh in the HF or exagerated thumpy LF, but still transparent.

guess that is a start, thanks!
i uploaded a picture of the m93e in my first post.

ok

lets say in the sub $80 to $140 range. and i uploaded a picture of the m93e in my first post.

Yikes!!! Bury it!

Ok, that's a really good budget, you can get quite an upgrade over the Black in that range.

One popular recommendation is the Audio Technica 440Mla, but I'm not 100% sure if that's going to suite your taste, as it's certainly not a warm cartridge. Your safest bet might be the Ortofon 2M Red, which I hear nothing but great things about. Again, it's not going to have the warmth of the Grado.

My default recommendation is often the Grado that fits into the person's maximum budget, in your case the Red, but obviously that defeats the whole purpose of this thread. Give it a little while and see what everybody else comes up with.

Before you give up on the Grado, did you try to play the Shure at all? Did it hum?

You have the 1st design headshell with the spring steel strap connectors in the back. VERY problematic. Dual later came out with spring loaded pin contacts. FAR superior. In addition, the contact plate that the removeable headshell makes contact with in the fixed headshell will be dirty and tarnished. Get some Noxon # 7 silver cleaner (Home Depots and the like) and a Q-tip and clean that contact plate. Those two changes will make a huge difference.

The irony is that the sound qualities you seek are in the Shure itself.

Although the outside of that cart looks nasty, it's probably fine inside the body, and the rust is on the stylus itself. My suggestion is the 91ED93E replacement stylus at Parts Express:

http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?&Partnumber=230-390

These have gotten excellent reviews here at AK (as well as five stars in the users reviews on that site) and you certainly can't beat the price.

i did play it, and no hum on it at all.

cleaned the contacts, they were pretty nasty.

where might i find the new version of the dual headshell adapter? i think ive seen it at like lp gear.

thanks

Before you give up on the Grado, did you try to play the Shure at all? Did it hum?

You have the 1st design headshell with the spring steel strap connectors in the back. VERY problematic. Dual later came out with spring loaded pin contacts. FAR superior. In addition, the contact plate that the removeable headshell makes contact with in the fixed headshell will be dirty and tarnished. Get some Noxon # 7 silver cleaner (Home Depots and the like) and a Q-tip and clean that contact plate. Those two changes will make a huge difference.

I had a feeling that for warmth you'd get recommendations to go with a particular Shure, but I don't really know much at all about those so I'll leave it to the experts. Personally I've used and do not recommend the M97XE, by the way.

the shure

well, im dig out the m93e and see what it looks inside, just because it would be neat to clean it up and try it out.

guess i should define warmth a bit more, and set my frame of reference as best as i can.

i have a pair of Nuemann u67's, 1961 tube mics. they have a warm sound to them, but at the expense of detail and brightness somewhat. an opposing pair is a pair of neumann-gefell m582's (1971 tube as well), they have a nice warmth on violin's, guitars and ukulele's, but are tight and the uppermids are responsive, crisp, but not lost. It has a brighter sound, but not harsh. so my point, i dont want the harshness that has been associated with some digital, and a lot of the HF that i hear on most systems. and with that, i dont want the loss of precision in the cartridge.

huh, i guess i want an expensive cartridge dont i, haha...if only the grado didnt hum...

but, im goin to dig up the m93e, try a new stylus, after i look inside it as best as i can to see if it is also nasty as well.

thanks, this is fun and easy to waste a work day thinkin about...

I got a tip once about the Grado Hum.
Take the cartridge wires if you can and twist them in sort of a braid.
It's a pain in the butt, but it worked for me with my Grado MC+

"I have a pair of Neumann" s, too!

couldn't let it go.

To answer your question, those Dual headshells are all over the 'bay.

Bill Neumann

huh, cool, ill give that a try tonight...

I got a tip once about the Grado Hum.
Take the cartridge wires if you can and twist them in sort of a braid.
It's a pain in the butt, but it worked for me with my Grado MC+

I got a tip once about the Grado Hum.
Take the cartridge wires if you can and twist them in sort of a braid.
It's a pain in the butt, but it worked for me with my Grado MC+

This worked for me also. I guess the RF cancels each other out when you twist them. Be REALLY careful, though.

Having said that, I really like the AudioTechnica 14S carts. Shibata stylus. Nice warm, coherent presentation.

ok will do...and yah, the wires seemed to be pretty, well, old and i dont want to fuck it up and have to order a new mounting plate. so ill give this a try tonight...

This worked for me also. I guess the RF cancels each other out when you twist them. Be REALLY careful, though.

One thing I did that might have helped more than twisting the wires was replacing the original interconnects with shielded ones, soldering them directly to the connector plate and bypassing the RCA jacks. My 1218 has zero hum now. I love that table...

I have a bunch of old Duels and a bunch of old Shures. I have bought four of those $8 stylus in the last year or so. They are elliptical and sound great. Oh..and that rust is nothing !

nice...

ok, any suggestions on how best to clean up the body of the cartridge? figure i might as well restore it and try it out, and if for anything have it as a backup, other option...fun stuff...

and yah, $8 for the stylus, and 2 bucks shipping even to hawaii, that is cheaper then a plate lunch with the cost of rice these days...

I have a bunch of old Duels and a bunch of old Shures. I have bought four of those $8 stylus in the last year or so. They are elliptical and sound great. Oh..and that rust is nothing !

Rice today.

Corn tomorrow.

Be careful cleaning the cartridge ! The hole where the cantilever goes will suck solvent up it like a straw and possibly ruin the whole body. Use super fine sand paper, tooth paste and brush, Vaseline to soften rust, I have rubbed the paint off old Shure just like your with my thumb. I would paint with a brush. Use Tesco flat black model paint for example.

Haven't any of you guys watched Antiques Roadshow?!!!

This is Authentic Patina we're talking about here!!!

:thmbsp:

You don't want to strip that stuff off!

(Okay, maybe just the loose crumbly bits...)

Check out the before and after photos of me taking a dremel to my shure m93e that came off a dual 1225:
Before:
http://la.gg/upl/100_4197.jpg
http://la.gg/upl/100_4199.jpg
http://la.gg/upl/100_4200.jpg
http://la.gg/upl/100_4200.jpg
And after:
http://la.gg/upl/100_4204.jpg
http://la.gg/upl/100_4206.jpg
http://la.gg/upl/100_4207.jpg

I used one of the small solid grey polishing wheels at first and then a felt polishing wheel. Turned out alright and the cartridge works fine.

Very nice job aperh! a real classic cartridge.

Dave

wow, nice job cleaning that up...ill have to try that on mine, bring the dremel home with me and see if i can make it look all fancy like that...

so i tried several of the sugestions people had for me and still hum there. I also have noticed that the cartridge seems to struggle with certain upper frequencies. in that i mean i can hear some distortion in complicated pieces of music. in the beginning of Carmine when the choir is really belting it out you hear distortion in it. not sure if that is what to be expected with the grado or not.

is this a sign of the cartridge not being aligned correctly? i have made sure it sits at a 90deg angle from bottom, is aligned on the protractor, it is at the desired 1.6 grams. what else? my cheap ass old phonopreamp just gettin overloaded?

dan

First of all, as someone else pointed out, that rippled black coating on the Shure was the original finish. It's not necessary to strip this down to bare metal, and it may affect how the plastic part of the stylus fits the body. I think just running a dremel brush over the thing will take off the dirt and rust and clean it sufficiently. Or follow Rybeam's toothpaste suggestion. The less you do on it, the less chance of getting grit inside.

As to the hum and high freqency distortion, you are still talking about the Grado black? Aside from tweaking the anti-skate or VTA, it could be the cart itself. Grados are not known to be the world's best trackers.

ok

thanks...i will keep the cleaning simple, as afforementioned. Im just gona do this cause why not, i took apart a 6+ grand tube mic to clean it up, so this is cake.

yah, im not sure what is up with the grado. i was very happy till i played some complicated stuff, then hered limitations...im gona try out some other carts and trouble shoot if it is the grado, or something else...i have had the same pair of headphones for 18 years and have only had to send them in once to get them cleaned, and wanted to give them a try...

thanks folks
dan

First of all, as someone else pointed out, that rippled black coating on the Shure was the original finish. It's not necessary to strip this down to bare metal, and it may affect how the plastic part of the stylus fits the body. I think just running a dremel brush over the thing will take off the dirt and rust and clean it sufficiently. Or follow Rybeam's toothpaste suggestion. The less you do on it, the less chance of getting grit inside.

As to the hum and high freqency distortion, you are still talking about the Grado black? Aside from tweaking the anti-skate or VTA, it could be the cart itself. Grados are not known to be the world's best trackers.

ok

thanks...i will keep the cleaning simple, as afforementioned. Im just gona do this cause why not, i took apart a 6+ grand tube mic to clean it up, so this is cake.

yah, im not sure what is up with the grado. i was very happy till i played some complicated stuff, then hered limitations...im gona try out some other carts and trouble shoot if it is the grado, or something else...i have had the same pair of headphones for 18 years and have only had to send them in once to get them cleaned, and wanted to give them a try...

thanks folks
dan

Dan, I haven't heard a Black, but I can tell you the higher models I've owned (Silver and Platinum) handle complicated music quite well. They just add some "air.":D

There's no chance of getting any of that crud inside the cartridge as the greenish corroded piece is just a metal sleeve that goes over the cartridge. If you gently tug on the leads at the butt end of the cartridge it should slide out fairly easily. It also did not affect the mounting of the stylus on my cartridge.

As far as warmth to equal the Grado - well that's hard. Of the 14 or 15 carts I have running right now, I think my Shure Premier (M75) is the closest to any of my Grados. Nice warm smooth cartridge. But you should know that I'm not running a stock stylus, but a after market T2 ED from Turntableneedles.com. The cartridge was almost free, but the stylus was like $34

http://www.turntableneedles.com/index.asp?PageAction=VIEWPROD&ProdID=9592

Yeah, duals and Grados don't always mix, too bad :(

yah

well, im goin to abandon the grado on the 1209. the hum issue, well, i guess i can deal with that, but there is issues with some of the high mids like when somone sings it overloads, distorts, which did not happen with the crudded up shure...so yah...its gettin pulled...

so from what ive read, the shure sounds like an option once i get the new styli, and clean it up...or an ortofon has been recomended to me highly by several people, either the red, or the om20super