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Cart not parallel after Mint LP alignment?

Howdy,

So after reading about 1000 paragraphs on how good the Mint LP Tractor is - I purchased one and had a marathon session yesterday with my new SL-1210 M5G, AT440MLa and Zupreme headshell...

After all was said and done - the alignment itself took 90 hard minutes - I am finding the cartridge sitting about 5-7 degrees "right" of center. The actual cantilever and stylus are about as dead on as I wanna go with it for now.

Now a comment and a question....

Question: Is this non-parallel result in the headshell normal? It's making me think I may have a bent cantilever or something.

Comment: I have run 10-12 sides thru the rig so far and I must say - I have not yet heard the "revelation" that others have described when comparing their alignments to other protractors or even the white Technics alignment gauge. The rig sounds good...but...what I am missing here.

I must temper the above by saying I have changed phono stages frequently in the last month as well...I was getting nicely familiar with a Bellari VP-130 and then moved that for a Cambridge which lasted less than a week and I now have a Moon LP3 with maybe 25 hours on it...Even my AT440MLa might have 40-50 hours on it as well....

I am thinking that a whole bunch of stuff might need to "burn" in before the system starts to really reveal itself.

But I am very concerned with the stylus/cantilever on the cart...even with all the moves the Mint required...I expected the cartridge to sit straight in the headshell...perhaps expecting too much?

Appreciate any feedback.

Cheers!

VP
vocalpoint
tvad
9,467 posts
 
When I owned my analog rig, the MintLP produced the most profound improvement of any tool in the box.

For me, the MintLP BestTractor was worth every penny and more.
lewm
6,770 posts
 
Dear vocalpoint, You might be interested to read the following post from Vinyl Asylum addressing just the question you are raising, whether you knew it or not:
http://www.audioasylum.com/audio/vinyl/messages/90/901608.html

The post supports my recollection that Stevenson and Technics are different. If they ARE different, that may account for the fact that you need to twist your cartridge a bit in the headshell in order to align it with the protractor. You might ask Yip what geometry he uses for Technics tts. I'd be interested to know the outcome. I would repeat however that I doubt this accounts for the fact that you are underwhelmed with your results.
lewm
6,770 posts
 
By the way, I agree with Tvad's very first post: If the cantilever is indeed bent a bit then that accounts for the "problem" you note, which is not per se a problem in fact.
tvad
9,467 posts
 
Just as a point of clarification, I was not commenting in my initial post about a bent cantilever.

The cartridge I set up with the MintLP on my Technics SL1200 with Zupreme headshell had a straight cantilever. That is to say the cantilever was parallel with the sides of the cartridge body.

However, after setting up the cart with the MintLP, the cartridge body was not parallel with the headshell.

The primary method employed by the MintLP is to set up cartridge by aligning the cantilever parallel with markings on the MintLP's mirrored surface. This is in contrast to a few cartridge set up templates I have used that guide the installer to adjust the cartridge's angle using the sides of the cartridge body as the reference (rather than the cantilever).
macdadtexas
1,794 posts
 
I love the MintLP tractor, and have bought one for every tonearm I have owned, and they do make a difference. That said, the difference is really based on how close you came to getting the geometry correct on your initial set up.

With my current rig, I found that the I had VERY little adjustment to do at all when I got the MintLP. When I set the cartridge down on the mirror the first time, it was about dead on from setting it up with the VPI jig that came with the turntable.
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