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My old and humble Pickering V15

vinilossolo

New Member
In 1985 i was given my first turntable, a Sansui sl-1050 with a Pickering V15 AT2 cartridge. Everybody said "wow, it's a Pickering". But it didn't sound right. LOTS of sibilance and distortion, specially at the inner grooves. There was no Internet so i had no cartridge and stylus spec info and an alignment protractor was something i had never heard of (I was living in Chile). Then came the CD craze and my Sansui finished in the basement for a very long time.

In 2010 i saw on Youtube a video of a Pioneer turntable with a Grado Black cartridge playing Pat Benatar's "Heartbreaker", a favorite of mine since i was a teenager. I was inmediatly bited by the new vinyl craze. I searched the basement and cleaned the dust of my old Sansui, conected to a Sony amplifier and speakers and played my old dusty records. I loved the ritual but again, it didn't sound right. But now we have Internet!

I searched for a new belt, headshell and stylus. Also i learned what an alignment protractor was. I bought a Swiss aftermarket DAT2 stylus for my Pickering V15 but now i understood i had to increased the tracking preasure. The sound was much better but not great. So i searched for an original V15 stylus and found a D5E on PickeringUK. The sound now was really great! I began to understand why a lot of people said "wow, a Pickering". Unfortunally that site has run out of supply. I found an original V15 DAME2 on The Voice of Music but they are also gone.

The new vinyl bug is terrible so now i had a big bunch of cartridges new and old, better Pickerings and Stantons cartridges, AT, Shures, Ortofon, etc. But a lot of times i found myself going back to my old and humble Pickering V15. Maybe it's nostalgia but there is something in that sound that i really love! My old Sansui is in my sister's home with a Stanton 500 cartridge mounted on it. I kept my Pickering...

Now the question. Pickering is out of business and LPGear and Jico have a lot of aftermarket replacements. Which are the best aftermarket stylus for this cartridge? Anyone has used LPGear and Jico replacements?

PickV15Dame2.jpg
 
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I have a Stanton D71EE stylus for one of mine. Its pretty much the same as the one linked above. Works well and it gives a nice light tracking elliptical.
 
If you don't mind tracking at 3+ grams, V-M Audio Enthusiasts has original Pickering DAC3 styli (605-D7C) available:

http://www.thevoiceofmusic.com/catalog/part_detail.asp?PNumberBase=605

They also have the brushless version (604-D7C).

Mine sounds smooth as silk at 3.5 grams:


I tried aftermarket equivalents from Pfanstiehl and TEI and they were sibilant as hell (surprising in the latter case, since TEI's Stanton 500 stylus is very good).
 
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I'm another big fan of the V15. I'm sure they're not the best available, but I am pretty satisfied with the sound of my EVG 604-DET and EVG 604-D7T. No sibilance that I've noticed, but I've never tried them at less than 2.7g (2-5g range, 3g recommended)

The EVG version of the D71EE that I have works OK at it's recommended tracking force, but I don't like it nearly as much as the heavier trackers. It's output is lower and the high end is somewhat rolled off.

I also tried the Pfanstiehl 4604-DEC and it just never sounded quite right. The Pfanstiehl 4604-D7C I tried sounded OK but the recommended tracking force is high at 4 grams. I plan to use in my little RCA RP190 45 RPM changer.
 
needlestein knows i love the stanton 500/ v15 and have wasted a lot of time on many lp gear stylus choices trying to find a replacement to match my originals., so comparing to originals, the best real stanton 500 sound i found was from the 4820 de, .03x.07 black with the red square from lp gear for i think $14, its that sound , , so i ordered a lifetime supply lol. also consider a audiophile sound for the v15 cart with a pickering d-ame-3 stylus with the brush , it will totally change your cart into a more complex high end sound for $39, besting my great nagaoka mp110, also if u put the litz wires on a v15 with the D-ame-3 stylus ,you will have to spend $300 or more to get close to that sound in a new cart.
 

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I have been experimenting with some Pickering replacements.

Pickering DE: Excellent. Very good on inner grooves. On my system, Technics SL1600 mk2), it needs 2 grams to kill sibilance completely.

Stanton D71e: sounds good but prone to sibilance. 2,5 grams to kill it.

Pickering DAME3: sounds very good but 3 grams to kill sibilance.

So the Jico and LPGear are over 3 grams?
 
just bought a stanton D71EE replacement (826-DE) from thevoiceofmusic.com for my pickering V-15. the cart came with am old PL-12D i picked up, and there was a loaded headshell, but i figured...new needle
 
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