Old cartridges

jimbo1421

Hello,

A few months ago a friend gave me an Akai AP-206 turntable (along with 15 boxes of records!). The turntable came with two cartridges, both Audio-Technica: an AT14Sa with Shibata tip and an AT-114SX. Both are 25-30 years old, and neither sound very good, kind of harsh in the upper frequencies. They were probably quite good when new; my generous friend wouldn't have lived with them otherwise. I have found OEM replacement styli for these online, but since these cartridges are long out of production I would think that the replacements are old stock as well.

So my questions are:

Would old stock replacements suffer from deterioration over time, especially the rubber mount where the cantilever passes through the shell?

Do cartridge bodies have a life span that would make replacing the stylus a waste of money?

If yes to either of these questions can anyone recommend a cartridge for under $200?

My system includes a Yamaha RX-V496 and SurroundBar 42 (at least for now)

Thanks,
Jim

billbillw

I have an AT15Sa, which is one step up from the AT14Sa. These are still very respectable cartridges. I use one on my VPI and am not ashamed of it.

To answer your question, if the stylus is sealed up good, and boxed, it should be protected from the various things that tend to deteriorate the cantilever suspension, namely UV exposure, ground level ozone exposure, and/or various atmospheric contaminants.

I purchased a new/old stock stylus from Ed Saunders about 3 years ago and have been more than happy with the purchase. It made a huge difference in the sound of the cartridge. If you buy one, I'd try to find an old stock Audio Technica stylus versus the generic ones. Check with Ed Saunders (www.jukemania.com), he seems to have a line on the old stock A-T stuff. Check the site map for 'special purchase of hard to find A-T styli)

jimbo1421

Thanks, Bill. I ordered a replacement for the AT14Sa this afternoon from stereoneedles.com. Jukemania had one also, but the picture didn't show the AT logo on the shell. That made me wonder if if it wasn't OEM.

Jim

billbillw

jimbo1421 wrote: »

Thanks, Bill. I ordered a replacement for the AT14Sa this afternoon from stereoneedles.com. Jukemania had one also, but the picture didn't show the AT logo on the shell. That made me wonder if if it wasn't OEM.

Jim

The ones from Jukemania are definitely genuine A-T regardless of what is pictured. I've talked to Ed about it a few times. Sometimes the A-T ones came with no logos because they were for OEM applications, but Ed guaranteed me that they were genuine. I guess it doesn't matter since the one from Stereoneedles is also genuine and the price is cheaper. It always pays to shop around.;)

hearingimpared

Wow Bill you always astound me with your knowledge and experience with vinyl rigs.

billbillw

hearingimpared wrote: »

Wow Bill you always astound me with your knowledge and experience with vinyl rigs.

I really don't have near as much experience as you and some of the others around here. I just happen to know a little about A-T carts and their replacements because I've had a handful of them in the last 5 years.

jimbo1421

I installed this stylus replacement last night. Examining it with a 16x hand lens I see that, when looked at from the front, the needle is tilted slightly toward the spindle side. Is this normal? If the cantilever is rotated out of line I would think that it would not be correctly aligned with the pickups inside the cartridge. Right? The original looks vertical compared to the maroon plastic stylus shell. Should I attempt to fix this? I could try to rotate the cantilever in its shell, but that seems really risky on such a delicate item. Or I could try to rotate the entire headshell/cartridge assembly on the tone arm to get the needle vertical to the record surface. This also seems really difficult. I rotated the headshell to get the cartridge aligned by eye using a mirror on the turntable platter and a lower power magnifying glass; there is a little allen screw on the clamp that holds the headshell to the tone arm. I doubt if I could really see the needle itself with that arrangement.

Should I just return the replacement stylus?

Thanks,

Jim

Fongolio

Do NOT attempt to rotate the cantilever!! Far too easy to damage or break it. You might try playing with the headshell/clamp to see if you can rotate it enough. Some tonearms have what is called an azimuth adjustment which will turn the arm to compensate for a not dead straight cantilever. If not perhaps a return is in order.

jimbo1421

Fongolio wrote: »

Do NOT attempt to rotate the cantilever!! Far too easy to damage or break it. You might try playing with the headshell/clamp to see if you can rotate it enough. Some tonearms have what is called an azimuth adjustment which will turn the arm to compensate for a not dead straight cantilever. If not perhaps a return is in order.

Thanks Fongolio. Twisting the cantilever with tweezers is out. But even if I can rotate the headshell to make the stylus vertical with respect to the record surface, that still leaves the stylus out of alignment with the internal workings of the cartridge, not so? By eye it looks like the stylus is off by 2-3 degrees. I would not think that is within specifications and that I would not get the best sound the cartridge is capable of. I ask so that I know a bit when I call customer service at stereoneedles.com.

Jim

jimbo1421

Finally! 11 weeks later I received a replacement stylus from stereoneedles.com. It took them over a month to decide to replace the bent one, then I pestered them for another 5 weeks, inquiring when they were actually going to send it. After bunches of e-mails and phone calls back and forth I finally got action when I disputed the charge with my credit card company on June 1. I sent the complete e-mail transcript to Wells Fargo, with a CC to stereoneedles.com. Within a half hour their sales guy called and said the replacement was "on the loading dock". It still took till June 5 to get from the loading dock to the post office. I suppose this was all an effort on their part to get me to forget about the whole deal and move on. Didn't work. Years ago, before the internet, I read a study showing that a satisfied customer will tell five others how well satisfied they are, but a dissatisfied one will tell fifteen. You, dear reader, are now one of those fifteen (thousand!).

The stylus is now in the cartridge and playing music. The sound is good, better than the original, but not great. I will soon be posting questions about tuning up my turntable.

Jim

TECHNOKID

jimbo1421 wrote: »

Finally! 11 weeks later I received a replacement stylus from stereoneedles.com. It took them over a month to decide to replace the bent one, then I pestered them for another 5 weeks, inquiring when they were actually going to send it. After bunches of e-mails and phone calls back and forth I finally got action when I disputed the charge with my credit card company on June 1. I sent the complete e-mail transcript to Wells Fargo, with a CC to stereoneedles.com. Within a half hour their sales guy called and said the replacement was "on the loading dock". It still took till June 5 to get from the loading dock to the post office. I suppose this was all an effort on their part to get me to forget about the whole deal and move on. Didn't work. Years ago, before the internet, I read a study showing that a satisfied customer will tell five others how well satisfied they are, but a dissatisfied one will tell fifteen. You, dear reader, are now one of those fifteen (thousand!).

The stylus is now in the cartridge and playing music. The sound is good, better than the original, but not great. I will soon be posting questions about tuning up my turntable.

Jim

Good job dealing with those procrastinating people jimbo1421! I sure hope you'll never ever buy from them again! Hope you get the TT tweeked to perfection soon!

jimbo1421

You can be sure I won't, TK. The stupid thing about it is that they could have simply said, "We can't warranty products after they have been installed by clutzy amateurs like you." Seeing their point, that I might have unknowingly did the damage, I would have just gone away grumpy and bought one somewhere else and be done with it. Alternately, if they had promptly sent a replacement I would be singing their praises in this forum and elsewhere. Stereoneedles.com now has neither a satisfied customer nor an $85 stylus. Dumb!

Jim