Who Is In The Linear Tracking Club?

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Grainger49

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Who out there has a straight line tracking arm?  I do, and this is how I got into it:

Many years ago, at (Fat) Julian's Audio I heard the best soundstage/imaging I had ever heard.  I went forward to replicate his system.  I very closely did. 

Julian had a VPI HW-19, Souther Tri-Quartz arm and a next to the top of the line Grado.  I got all of these.  Julian didn't have a CD player in his shop.
 
I had one of those in the 70's - A Thorens. It was a beautiful piece. I wish I still had it. Doing a ton of LSD back then. That factored into it.... it think.
 
A TON Eric? or a metric ton?

I had a cheap P-mount Technics straight line tracker waaay back. Don't really remember how good it sounded. As for the concept, I couldn't be more for it. I am not sure how well they work in practice. It seems to be a tricky thing to pull off. iT JUST MAKES SENSE TO TRACK A GROOVE THE SAME WAY IT WAS CUT. Dam caps lock key...Anyway, I wonder if there are albums cut with a tangent tracking cutting arm? hmmmm
 
As Grainger noted, I have a Souther LT tonearm on a VPI turntable.  Basically, I just copied Grainger's set-up.  And I am happy I did.  I have heard regular tonearms with no inner groove distortion (like an SME IV on a truly expensive Sota) but I never could get my Rega and such to work well.  I am hoping the Souther I have works for the rest of my life.  I have no plans to upgrade it ever.  Could buy a ClearAudio LT but I don't see spending that kind of $$$$ anytime soon short of having to replace the arm I have for mechanical reasons.  And the arm is so straightforward, I think it really should last for decades and decades.
 
I'm in the process of getting back into vinyl and this thread is very interesting to me. I was trying to find more information on the Souther tonearm, but my google searches do not come up with any results. Could someone point me in the right direction for information on the arm.

Thanks,
Brad 
 
Souther sold his design to Sutchy of Clearaudio back some time in the 90s.  The carriage rides on quartz rods.  There are two ball bearing wheels in the front and one in the rear.  (it could be vice versa) 

What information are you looking for?
 
Yeah the Souther/Clearaudio arms today are pretty expensive, gorgeous pieces of work, but pricey... The BEST bang for the buck and VERY highly reviewed as well is the TERMINATOR LT air bearing arm...anyone interested in an LT arm should check it out on the net..... Dumb name but supposedly competes with cost no object arms according to the reviewer.... I myself have a Technics SL-10 I bought from new and have loved it ever since....
 
I looked up some of the turntables that were mentioned as well as the TERMINATOR LT arm and they are out of my price range at the moment. I think that I will need to to look at one of the entry tables that are available to start with. I'm thinking around $500 or so.
 
4krow said:
A TON Eric? or a metric ton?
Click to expand...

Hey Greg, since you are curious it was a tonne. I was actually British for a spell. Then it wore off. Crackhander useless knob I was. Completely mental - barking!
 
Yea, linear tacking tonearms are hard to do for $500.  The old Southers from the 80s go for that and that is for the tonearm alone.  There are new air bearing arms for something like $700 or so?  I forget the name off the top of my head  But to get something like a used Souther on a used VPI HW will be around $1K give or take, plus a cartridge.
 
Yeah, and really, 1K is quite a good price for a vpi and a souther to say the least.... the Terminator arm is the cheapest "best value" air bearing LT arm available... on the other hand, when I was at the London hi fi show.. I was in the Aurum Cantus room, and they were demoing the simplest, smallest "conventional" LT arm i have ever seen.... I cant remember what it was selling for but it was peanuts.. I believe it was called the Aurum Cantus Opus 3.... However, I have yet to have ever seen one on the market so I dont know what they did with it.... Really the BEST scenario is either a used SL-10 like mine and have it gone through and use a DC power supply, or the BETTER option is to copy Grainger and  Paully.. That combo HAS to be around the best value in TTs today...
 
If you want a conventional TT and arm for under 5 benjis, I would imagine a Pro-ject, Music Hall or Rega are the top 3 contenders... I just ran across this regarding the Music Hall MMF 2.2 table.........."The Music Hall MMF 2 is our pick for best turntable under 500. The reason being the provided Tracker cartridge and arm are much better than the Rega and Pro-ject options. The cartridge has a lot of life to it and tracks very well"..... this is of course, if you dont want to mess with the used market...
 
The MH and Pro-ject options are what I have been looking at. I figiure that would be a good start and there are a few upgrade options I could take advantage of while I continue to save and look at as the next step.
 
I am surely no expert here, but was very impressed with the arm that came with my VPI scout. It had a single point mount, at least as best I could describe. No doubt, it took extra care to set up, but to this day it remains one of the best tone arms I have ever owned.
 
BNAL,  I agree with you in regards to your choice for entry level tables... I think you may well be satisfied for the time being while you search for your next level TT.... I like the fact that you get an arm and cartridge as well... so when you get it, its rock and roll time immediately!!... and I also  agree with the VPI scout post.. I heard the scout with the "unipivot" arm again at the London hifi show.. it was retailing for 1100 uk pounds which was quite a deal.. All I know was the German distributor guy who was demoing was SUPER excited about it... The table sounded real nice, however, we cant AB anything at the hifi shows of course so , it is tough to evaluate in those conditions... but a scout is a good "used" option also....
 
Yes BNAL, an MMF 2.2 for around $450 is tough to beat for a starter TT... AND you can outfit it with one of these FINE Hello Kitty! cartridges!!...... :)
 

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Ok, here is mine... It is even included in Wikipedia, and there is an example on permanent display at the Museum of  Modern Art.....
 

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I had one of the Mitsubishi vertical turntables with the linear tracking arm many years ago. I found it to be average sounding and exceptionally finicky. Also had a Marantz SLT-12 for a while. Didn't knock me out either. Had a very strange system of swinging weights that lifted the arm at the inner groove or something, IIRC. Neither of these tables had a great cartridge, so they probably didn't get a fair shake.
 
I was not aware the Technics was at MoMA 

I was aware of the B&O 4002

http://www.moma.org/collection/object.php?object_id=86311

Don't own one - used to sell them back in the day. Like little girls with curls "when they are good they are very very good and when they are bad...."

Would not want to try to fix one.  There is an awful lot going on under the hood. 
 
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