I am at the end of my rope, please help

Hifihvn, all of the specs that I've ever seen for digital multimeters do not provide enough information to determine the safety of their resistance or continuity functions with respect to a LOMC. The things that have to be known are the voltage the meter puts out into an open circuit when in those modes, and the output impedance of the meter when in those modes. That information together with the coil resistance specification of the cartridge would allow calculation of how much current would flow through the coil.

Without intimate knowledge of the design of the cartridge, it would then still not be possible to precisely say how much current would be safe, or for how much time a given amount of current could be safely applied.

The meters on analog multimeters typically move to full scale (which would indicate 0 ohms for the ohmmeter function) when the current flow is somewhere between 50 ua (microamps) and 1 ma (milliamp). The Lyra Titan i cartridge is spec'd to provide 0.5 mv (millivolts) into a load that can be as low as 10 ohms. 0.5 mv/10 ohms = 50 ua. So an analog ohmmeter for which 50 ua results in full scale meter deflection would certainly be safe. But one which required 1 ma for full scale deflection would be putting 20 times as much current through the cartridge as it would normally be called upon to provide under worst case loading.

Regards,
-- Al

Almarg,Thanks for the info.It would help if they did give more info about Digital Meters.I can't find any info either.I think the info that came with my meter,is the same as they provide on the net.They seemed to help phase out Vacuum Tube Voltmeters.I hope I don't ever run into this type of situation.

Forgive someone who has NO ee knowledge from chiming in, but you may want to consider contacting member jcarr who, IIRC, designs and manufactures Lyra carts.

From the last set of measurements, it sounds like the arm wiring is fine.

OK- so with 2 different cartridges the same thing happens. And if you swap the cables from the tone arm left for right at the input of the phono section, the problem moves. All that is left really is the cartridges. So its either something common to their setup in the arm, or both have a similar problem. Now, the latter is really rare, but it could happen if both cartridges got subjected to something that could damage them.

I would put the DVM on DC voltage, and connected it to the inputs of the phono section, just to make sure you are not dealing with a malfunction that is putting DC on the inputs (like a shorted tube). If that's OK- the idea that you got 2 bad cartridges at the same time gains credence.

The problem here is that Audiorader is not always responsive to the questions, which perhaps is understandable given the large number of inquiries. But as a result, we are going off in all directions basing our ideas on incorrect assumptions in some cases. Al, I asked the same question you asked re whether he is using a continuity checker or a real ohmmeter. He has not responded. However, it would seem that he is indeed using a continuity checker, which, as you, and I earlier, surmised may not distinguish the 5-ohm resistance across the Lyra Titan coils from "continuity".

If he really has changed out all the interconnect wiring without any benefit, I stand corrected. It was not clear to me that he has tried that. As far as I could tell back when I made my last post (and I do mean my LAST post), he had changed out cartridges and tonearms. The typical Grandezza I have seen in photos provides female RCA jacks into which one then inserts ones ICs of choice. It was not clear to me that he had swapped channels at both ends of his ICs. Or indeed simply inserted a fresh pair of ICs.