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Nagaoka MP11, headshells, compliance

H

highcut28

pfm Member
I bought this MM cartridge new (at a shop at Spores Adelphi) recently.
Cheap and very very cheerful.
http://www.tnt-audio.com/sorgenti/nagaoka_mp11_e.html
I am currently using it on Rega planar 2, standard old arm, mounted in a niceADC headshell (that in the early 80s we were all encouraged to go out and buy - more below)
Was wondering if it will be OK in a 3012 series 2.
Tony, i know you must be blue in the face explaining cartridge compliance and arm suitability on many of your posts.
This dumbo does not really understand. High compliance means big and heavy? so should this rather big MP11 be ok in the 3012?

Yep we were all encouraged by all the mags to throw out those flimsy headshells and replace with this gem from ADC, bolt cartridge in tightly with pliers and screwdriver, ah.. and enjoy better bass, imagery, PRAT blah blah blah.
So why am i still seeing flimsy perforated SME headshells on your arms huh?
 
highcut28 said:
This dumbo does not really understand. High compliance means big and heavy? so should this rather big MP11 be ok in the 3012?
Click to expand...

Cartridge size, weight and compliance are entirely unrelated to one another. The compliance is how soft or hard the suspension is, i.e. how 'wiggly' the stylus assembly is. The is measured in 'cu', which probably stands for something, but thankfully we do not need to know what. What we do need to know is:

a) the effective mass of the tonearm.

b the weight of the cartridge.

c) the compliance of the cartridge.

Now we can use this graph:

armcompliance.gif


In your case the effective mass of a SME 3012 (with standard headshell) is 14g, the weight of a MP11 is 6.8g, and the compliance is 8cu. We also need to add in about 0.75 to 1g for the cartridge bolts. This gives a mass of about 21.8g. As you can see from the graph this falls very nicely in the blue area, so all is good with the world.

highcut28 said:
Yep we were all encouraged by all the mags to throw out those flimsy headshells and replace with this gem from ADC, bolt cartridge in tightly with pliers and screwdriver, ah.. and enjoy better bass, imagery, PRAT blah blah blah.
So why am i still seeing flimsy perforated SME headshells on your arms huh?
Click to expand...

If you are talking about my TD-124 / 3009 it's because the deck is restored, not tweaked, riced or audiophooled-up. My aim was to return it to as close to 1966-68 factory spec as I could. Putting a big heavy headshell on that deck would be like sticking big fat alloys or a spoiler onto an E-Type. Just sick and wrong!

FWIW much of what was written in the 80s about headshells and especially bolt tightness was utter bollocks IMO, a lot of good arms were ruined by idiots in possession of what was at most a half-truth. 99% of it was marketing rhetoric put about by those looking to sell tonearms of a very different design school.

Tony.
 
Thanks for all that very useful info Tony, delivered in the style we have become accustomed to.
I also have a heavier non perforated SME headshell. For use with lighter cartridges presumably.
Is that graph for the 3012 or can it apply to any arm?
 
The non-perforated headshell would be ideal for a lower compliance cartridge such as a Denon DL-103, which is a nice match with the 3012.

The graph is universal.

Tony.
 
Tony L said:
The non-perforated headshell would be ideal for a lower compliance cartridge such as a Denon DL-103, which is a nice match with the 3012.

The graph is universal.

Tony.
Click to expand...

Thanks again Tony, yr comments re Denon noted and it may be time to make that move into MCs.
 
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