advertisement


What Makes Miyajima Cartridges Different?

Shuggie

Shuggie

Trade: Ammonite Audio
Miyajima cartridges are designed differently, compared to conventional moving coil designs; and as a result produce notably lower distortion, to rather lovely musical effect. Miyajima produced this quaint animation to describe how and why this is the case:

[youtube]-UArwUMW7YE[/youtube]

This is not techno-waffle - the benefits of Miyajima's patented design can be clearly heard. As far as I know, only Rega have also departed from moving coil convention with the Apheta and Aphelion, but in a different manner (nice thinking, though).
 
Indeed, Miyajima Labs cartridges can sound very good and I am sure the cross ring design helps, but several other Japanese cartridge manufacturers also use a similar design. However you need to be very careful what tonearm you use with these cartridges, as they were designed for the classic high mass detachable headshell type tonearms like Fidelity Research, SAEC, etc etc. To get the best from Miyajima Labs cartridges you need a tonearm with an effective mass in excess of 20grams, preferably nearer to 30grams otherwise you risk the chance of cartridge mistracking.
 
I have bought an old Fidelity Research FR64S tonearm specifically to demonstrate the Miyajimas, but that said the entry-level Takumi stereo cartridge seems very happy indeed in a medium mass arm like a 9" Jelco SA-750D (even more so the 10" SA-750E), but also my Audio Note Arm III (v2) which is rumoured to have something like 12g effective mass. The Shilabe sounds very nice in the 10" Jelco, but in the 9" version needs a heavier headshell such as the Acoustical Systems Arche 5D to come on song. I have a feeling that in Jelco's range, the 10" SA-750E represents a natural 'sweetspot' and it's a shame that it can't be fitted to my TD-124.

The very low compliance Miyajima mono cartridges really do sing when partnered with a weighty tonearm and I was listening to one in an Ikeda arm at a friend's house last week - a fabulously musical pairing. Lovely tonearm too, at a price. I have a customer who is using a Mono Zero B in a Graham Phantom arm and he reports that the results are stunning - I can't find effective mass quoted for the Phantom but it's probably on the upper side of medium.

I quite like the way that Mr Miyajima deliberately dismisses solid boron cantilevers etc and follows his own principles, which do seem to deliver wonderful results.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.


advertisement


Back
Top