Wood armwand vs Metal armwand

How about carbon fiber? This is used by many manufactures.

Or better yet composites such a metal wood laminates or other combinations. I believe these would provide the best solution for resonances while allowing the designer to maintain an optimal mass.

I have also seen lexan used. Scheu has one that is truss shaped.

@Hiho

"But the wood arm can give you splinters!"

When carbon fiber breaks it splinters a whole lot more than wood. Fibers in the eyes and lungs is not very pleasant.

Ralph, that is true. It is kind of a stretch to compare tonearms to speakers. Just trying to point out the differences in the sound of materials.

I should have been more specific about the speakers, even though it is a bit off topic. I meant the crop of speakers using all metal enclosures. The ones I have heard are missing the body of the sound. Just not natural sounding to me. I have heard a few speakers with metal cones sound good with the right surrounding eq. I've been told the trick with metal drivers is to cross them over well before their break up point. The only metal tweeters I care for are ribbons.

With speakers, the good ones usually try to make the fact they use wood a non-factor; try to make the enclosures inert. And not have the wood try to be part of the signature of the speaker, that is adding its own resonances to color the sound.