We all know that the small things matter in hi-fi. Especially at the front end of the audio system – eg. the pickup cartridge and tonearm.
The Trans-Fi Terminator tonearm is constructed with a 6mm aluminium ‘L’ Mounting Plate. It’s machined shape and necessary slotted holes, no doubt reduce its structural and torsional rigidity.
Would there be energy loss? Continue reading
The Aura turntable was designed by New Zealander, Dave Whittaker and was manufactured in NZ and Australia over a period of 20 years from the mid 1980s.
This beautiful example of the Aura, is still in use in California at the home of Skipper Wise – musician, recording artist and co-founder of Blue Microphones.
Skipper’s interesting story about his Aura TT tells us also about the affable and gracious man that Dave Whittaker was: Continue reading
The Terminator linear tracking tonearm combines an air-bearing with a (twin) ‘uni-pivot’ bearing.
Uni-pivot bearings need to be stabilised in order to handle the energy generated by a pick-up cartridge.
In this case, twin pivot points were in metal-to-metal contact with the arm-slider ‘V-brackets’ and some instability or ‘bearing rattle’ can be audible at times. Continue reading
This guy costs US$395 / £198 – not a small sum, but in hi-fi terms, a bargain I’d suggest.
The current Rega tonearms are descendants of the original legendary RB250/300 tonearms introduced in 1983. They still sound excellent. And importantly I think, sound a lot like real music.
I owned (and enjoyed) a Linn Sondek with Ittok tonearm from the same period, for over 10 years, but I don’t remember the Ittok sounding this much fun! Continue reading
Using the unipivot bearing from my previous DIY Balsa Wood tonearm, I wanted to make a 12 inch (305mm) long tonearm.
I already had some solid wood, a locally available hardwood from the Pacific region called Kwila (Merbau).
This timber is dense (around 850 kg/cu m) – but importantly, this wood is stiff, it has a solid tone and ‘fast’ response when tested. Continue reading
From quite a few years ago, this was my version of a Uni-pivot tonearm design by the late Dave Whittaker, creator of the Aura Turntable.
Dave knew that wood would provide good damping – he chose to use lightweight Balsa wood.
He thought also that the open truss structure would be low in resonances. Continue reading
This is a follow-up to my Terminator linear tracking tonearm post in last Feb.
I mentioned Effective Mass and how it differs significantly in the horizontal and vertical planes.
Poul Ladegaard’s “Tangential Tonearm” experimental work is informative here. Continue reading
