I managed to otain this cartridge at a silly cheap price. It fits my Pioneer PL-510A well. However I am experiencing a little trouble and wondered if anyone has any advice. The cartridge is very light and skips. I am having trouble keeping it on my records. Should I add extra weight, or is there a better solution?
Ortofon DJ Concorde Pro-S Cartridge ProS Stylus
- Thread starter Tobydog1
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From information I saw online, the PL-510A headshell weighs 9 grams, and the suitable cartridge weight range is given as 4-10 grams. This gives a combined weight of 13-19 grams, and since your Concorde Pro S is spec'd at 18.5 grams, it should be plenty heavy. I did see in a service manual for the PL-510A that there is a sub weight included for use with cartridges weighing over 8.5 grams. I don't know what it looks like, but if this is installed you might gain a little benefit by removing it. How far from the recommended 4 grams of tracking weight are you now?
lini
just me...
Are you sure, you got the right thing? I.e., as you've stated, that the cartridge is very light, maybe you got one of the old Hifi Concordes, and it's just been equipped with a Pro S needle by a previous owner. If in doubt, you might want to post a pic...
Greetings from Munich!
Manfred / lini
Beobloke
Super Member
Probably purple, because aliens don't generally wear hats.
NachoTemino
Active Member
Concorde carts are made for the Technics overhang distance (52mm), which is a bit longer than Pioneer (49mm). Take that also into account.
KentTeffeteller
Gimpus Stereophilus!
OM ProS tracks what it will track at 2 grams, no problem.
KentTeffeteller
Gimpus Stereophilus!
Agreed. OP needs to post a picture of what he has. The original HiFi Concorde without the added weight won't play nice on a mid-mass tonearm.
I honestly don't know. A measuring device is next purchase.
Juat taken photos. Will post later today
Your counterweight should be able to tell you. Since you mentioned that the stylus is able to touch the record, but tracks too light and skips, then we at least know you can zero balance the arm. If you balance the arm so it floats horizontally and turn just the black vertical tracking force ring to "0," then you can turn the counterweight forward as far as it will go while watching the numbers on the vtf ring. You can see if it gets to 1 gram, 2 grams, and so on. If the picture I saw online was actually a PL-510A counterweight, you'd need the ring to go all the way around to "0" to reach 4 grams.
NachoTemino
Active Member
If I am not wrong, the "original" concorde cartridges (from the late seventies) weight was 6.5gr and the "new" ones are 18.5 gr. That is a HUGE difference that well could be the cause of the skipping as the arm won't balance expecting a minimum of 15 grams.
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This would be enough to discourage me from running a Concorde on the PL-510A.
You can't fix the resulting stereo imaging and inner groove distortion problems.
A comparable OM cartridge would be fine of course. Still not a choice of dreams for HiFi use with a Pro S stylus.
On another forum, a poster quoted a response from Ortofon on this subject, which included, "We have taken a look at quite a few calculations of tonearm geometry as it pertains to distortion caused by improper overhang, and generally what we’re seeing is about 0.5% increase in average distortion and a 1% increase in maximum distortion (right at the end of side). We’ve listened to the Concordes extensively on a variety of tonearms that do not match the geometry they’re intended for, and the performance has always been excellent. It might be worth giving it a try."
It will be interesting to see the picture the OP said he would post later on. My assumption is that he has a current DJ-oriented Concorde Pro S, and if the skipping issue can get sorted out I think it's well worth giving it a try. I've had a few different heavy-tracking DJ cartridges on my turntables over the years, and I've always enjoyed the music they gave me.
Ortofon says of the Pro S, whether Concorde or OM, "The sound quality is absolutely not to worry about. The Pro S is a consistent performer and a fine all-arounder!" I expect my ears would agree, even with a small overhang error. I once had a BIC 920 turntable with no adjustment for overhang or offset angle, and whatever I bolted to the headshell sounded fine, though I did stick just to heavier-tracking conicals.
NachoTemino
Active Member
Understandable response from Ortofon. Neither Ortofon (nor any company that wants to make money) will ever tell you that their product is invalid and that you should not buy it.
I am not saying that this cartridge/tonearm combination won't work, but rather that it won't deliver optimal sound across all areas of the record.
The Ortofon Concorde is a great cartridge suitable for a wide variety of use cases, depending on the stylus that the user puts on it. Your Pro S spherical stylus is fine for everyday playback.
A far as skipping, spherical styluses may skip if one or more of these elements are not dialed in correctly:
- incorrect tracking force (2 - 4 grams is appropriate for the current Pro S).
- anti -skate set to high
- turntable is not level
- a dirty record groove
Assuming that you're cleaning your records before playback, you might focus on the other possibilities.
A far as skipping, spherical styluses may skip if one or more of these elements are not dialed in correctly:
- incorrect tracking force (2 - 4 grams is appropriate for the current Pro S).
- anti -skate set to high
- turntable is not level
- a dirty record groove
Assuming that you're cleaning your records before playback, you might focus on the other possibilities.
lini
just me...
Alright... From your pics your Concorde body doesn't look like a Hifi Concorde body and also not like one of the 15 g Concorde bodies (STD & EC10). And I'm not aware, that there would have been a black variant of the 16 g bodies of the 1st and 2nd gen. Concorde Pro. So I'd think, thank your Concorde body would belong to the 18.5 g bodies.
However, from your 2nd pic above (= IMG_9422.JPG) it would look to me, that your Pro S needle might be damaged. So I'd suggest you to post pics of that needle - without the needle guard - and best removed from the body and placed bootom side up, ideally one bottom view (for checking cantilever orientation, as that would seem off to me from that 2nd pic), one front view (as the azimuth might be off as well) and one side view ('cause who knows...).
Greetings from Munich!
Manfred / lini
KentTeffeteller
Gimpus Stereophilus!
This is a Concorde later model (basically a ProS). I am using one on my Technics SL-1200 Mk II right now (with a Stylus 10 fitted). Mine that way tracks beautifully at 1.5 grams. I think you need a new stylus for yours (pro tip, KABUSA has a replacement Reloop Black stylus (the ProS equivalent for $25 plus shipping). His Black styli are new, removed from Concorde Blacks being upgraded with OM HiFi styli.