boreas
"If it sounds good, it IS good." E.K.E.
Somewhere along the way I picked up a Grado MF-3 cartridge with a nackered stylus. It's a P-mount based on what's now the Prestige body and has "ears" integrated into it, just like those on the Prestige, so you can mount it to a 1/2" headshell without any sort of adapter. Grado, however, chose to complicate matters by designing a "tonearm decoupler" which was to be inserted between the cartridge and headshell, providing for only 3 points of contact between the two pieces: one at each of the mounting bolts and a third center front on the cartridge. This can be seen http://www.vinylengine.com/library/grado/m-series.shtml.
This still leaves the connecting pins unaddressed. Conventional P-mount pins are considerably smaller in diameter than those on a 1/2" cartridge. Grado's solution to this was to provide little slip-on "sleeves" that fit over the existing pins and "fattened them up" to the size needed for regular headshell wire connectors.
Needless to say, both these sleeves and the tonearm decoupler long ago became NLA. I confirmed this through an email to Grado. I also asked John if mounting the cartridge directly, without the decoupler, or with the use of a conventional P-mount adapter was advisable. He said it wasn't and suggested (of course) that I buy a new cartridge from current production.
Well, based on this information, I essentially punted and tossed the cartridge into the box containing my ragtag collection of orphaned cartridges but, with a fair amount of downtime over the holidays, I started looking for little projects. The Grado got the nod.
I essentially ruled out the use of a regular P-mount adapter because a: the mounting holes in the adapter didn't line up with those in the Grado body (figures) and b: using the adapter would increase the inherent VTA of the cartridge and c: I reasoned that, since the body is the same in all important respects to the current Prestige line, mounting the MF-3 directly would result in the same situation as that currently recommended by Grado.
But what about the pins? I couldn't find anything at my local electronics supplier that would serve in place of Grado's sleeves. There are those in a P-mount adapter, of course, but I doubt that you could remove the pins without destroying them.
That left modifying the standard P-mount adapter as seemingly the best option, so I did. Basically, I cut away everything but the back portion of the adapter and beveled the top surface of what remained so that it only the cartridge and not the adapter contacts the headshell. The modified adapter I ended up with weighs 0.7g, making the total installed weight of the cartridge 7.2g.
Photos attached. I'd love some feedback from those of you more familiar with Grados (I'm not at all) as to whether this is a viable approach. If it's not, then I won't bother with a new stylus but if it is, maybe it'll help someone else facing a similar situation.
Thanks!
John
This still leaves the connecting pins unaddressed. Conventional P-mount pins are considerably smaller in diameter than those on a 1/2" cartridge. Grado's solution to this was to provide little slip-on "sleeves" that fit over the existing pins and "fattened them up" to the size needed for regular headshell wire connectors.
Needless to say, both these sleeves and the tonearm decoupler long ago became NLA. I confirmed this through an email to Grado. I also asked John if mounting the cartridge directly, without the decoupler, or with the use of a conventional P-mount adapter was advisable. He said it wasn't and suggested (of course) that I buy a new cartridge from current production.
Well, based on this information, I essentially punted and tossed the cartridge into the box containing my ragtag collection of orphaned cartridges but, with a fair amount of downtime over the holidays, I started looking for little projects. The Grado got the nod.
I essentially ruled out the use of a regular P-mount adapter because a: the mounting holes in the adapter didn't line up with those in the Grado body (figures) and b: using the adapter would increase the inherent VTA of the cartridge and c: I reasoned that, since the body is the same in all important respects to the current Prestige line, mounting the MF-3 directly would result in the same situation as that currently recommended by Grado.
But what about the pins? I couldn't find anything at my local electronics supplier that would serve in place of Grado's sleeves. There are those in a P-mount adapter, of course, but I doubt that you could remove the pins without destroying them.
That left modifying the standard P-mount adapter as seemingly the best option, so I did. Basically, I cut away everything but the back portion of the adapter and beveled the top surface of what remained so that it only the cartridge and not the adapter contacts the headshell. The modified adapter I ended up with weighs 0.7g, making the total installed weight of the cartridge 7.2g.
Photos attached. I'd love some feedback from those of you more familiar with Grados (I'm not at all) as to whether this is a viable approach. If it's not, then I won't bother with a new stylus but if it is, maybe it'll help someone else facing a similar situation.
Thanks!
John
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Actually, since marcmorin indicated that they were essentially useless (and since I had more or less concluded that on my own), I think I'll pass on your generous offer.