Hi , i bought a technics sl-1800 mk1 from ebay but am unsure of how to set it up !
it came with a ortofon om pro s cart , i am aware its a dj cart but its all i can use at the moment.
ive never had a tt before so.....
i can set up the "static balanced arm" so it hovers level with the tt
but am unsure of what tracking force to use ? it goes from 0.1 to 3.9
and im not sure about tracking angle ? how do i do this and how many mm should the stylus be from the headshells connecting "lip" ?
thanks in advance for all/any help !!!!!!
it came with a ortofon om pro s cart , i am aware its a dj cart but its all i can use at the moment.
ive never had a tt before so.....
i can set up the "static balanced arm" so it hovers level with the tt
but am unsure of what tracking force to use ? it goes from 0.1 to 3.9
and im not sure about tracking angle ? how do i do this and how many mm should the stylus be from the headshells connecting "lip" ?
thanks in advance for all/any help !!!!!!
To set cartridge alignment you will need a protractor. You can download one from The Vinyl Engine, you will find easy to follow instructions there aswell.
Nip onto the Ortofon site to find out what the tracking force should be.
Good luck!
Nip onto the Ortofon site to find out what the tracking force should be.
Good luck!
The tracking force suggested by Ortofon is 3 to 5 grams. Ortofon say that the recommended weight is 3g in their pdf specification file, but on their website say 4g, but as it’s aimed at DJ’s (toughness before sound quality), I’d try 3g. As you know, it most definitely isn’t hi-fi, and won’t do much for your records at those weights. DJ’s aren’t interested in how good it sounds, but how tough the stylus is to stand up to their ridiculous antics! The good news is, that seeing it’s an Ortofon OM series cartridge, it can take any of the styli in the OM range, either DJ or hi-fi styli. The hi-fi styli range from cheap £22.50 ones (stylus 5) all the way up to really excellent styli (stylus 30 or 40) at up to £140.00, with line contact (parabolic) tips.
If you want to set up your cartridge, one of the cheapest ways is to go to an Ortofon dealer, and buy the excellent Ortofon set up protractor, which is very cheap (AU$2.85 in Australia at http://www.speakerbits.com ). It enables you to set up the cartridge so that it is at a tangent to the record groove at two specific points on the record. It’s a little bit hard with the Ortofon OM cartridges unfortunately, because they don’t have straight sides, so you have to imagine a line drawn down the middle of the cartridge. The UK distributor don’t show it on their website (see below), but I’d imagine you could probably get it in England, or from Europe (maybe direct from Ortofon in Denmark).
Ortofon also have an excellent little plastic stylus balance to set up the tracking weight very accurately at low cost (₤5.00 at http://www.henleydesigns.co.uk ). It is actually calibrated in milliNewtons (mN), but if you remember that 9.8 (say 10) mN is equivalent to 1 gram, it works very well, and is much cheaper than the metal Shure equivalent, or the expensive Cartridge Man digital scales. It’s a good idea to check that your turntable weight scale is accurate, before you rely on it, particularly if it’s an ex-DJ turntable. However, your Technics turntable is an excellent turntable, and because of DJ’s reliance on the Technics SL-1200, you’ll have cheap spares and repair manuals (see the Vinyl Engine website) for years to come.
The other thing which you have to do to set up your turntable is to set the anti-skating (sometimes called bias) adjustment. This is because the revolution of the record causes the cartridge to be pulled towards the centre of the record, and the anti-skating adjustment needs to be set to provide an equivalent opposing force out towards the edge of the record, so that the inside of the stylus, and your record grooves, will wear evenly. On your Technics turntable, I think that it is set by a small control near the base (pivot point) of the tonearm (just to the right of the tonearm), which should be calibrated in grams tracking force, and which you turn so it is set to the same as the tracking force of the cartridge. It will probably also have two calibration settings – one for spherical styli (sometimes indicated by a circle symbol, or ‘S’), and one for elliptical and parabolic styli (indicated by ‘E’ or an oval symbol). Just set it based on what stylus type you have. Anti-skating can be set up more accurately using a test record, such as the excellent English Hi-fi News and Record Review/Cartridge Man (HFNRR) test record, or one of the Shure test records (widely available on Ebay). The HFNRR test record also comes with protractors to set up the cartridge properly, together with instructions on how to do it.
If you want to set up your cartridge, one of the cheapest ways is to go to an Ortofon dealer, and buy the excellent Ortofon set up protractor, which is very cheap (AU$2.85 in Australia at http://www.speakerbits.com ). It enables you to set up the cartridge so that it is at a tangent to the record groove at two specific points on the record. It’s a little bit hard with the Ortofon OM cartridges unfortunately, because they don’t have straight sides, so you have to imagine a line drawn down the middle of the cartridge. The UK distributor don’t show it on their website (see below), but I’d imagine you could probably get it in England, or from Europe (maybe direct from Ortofon in Denmark).
Ortofon also have an excellent little plastic stylus balance to set up the tracking weight very accurately at low cost (₤5.00 at http://www.henleydesigns.co.uk ). It is actually calibrated in milliNewtons (mN), but if you remember that 9.8 (say 10) mN is equivalent to 1 gram, it works very well, and is much cheaper than the metal Shure equivalent, or the expensive Cartridge Man digital scales. It’s a good idea to check that your turntable weight scale is accurate, before you rely on it, particularly if it’s an ex-DJ turntable. However, your Technics turntable is an excellent turntable, and because of DJ’s reliance on the Technics SL-1200, you’ll have cheap spares and repair manuals (see the Vinyl Engine website) for years to come.
The other thing which you have to do to set up your turntable is to set the anti-skating (sometimes called bias) adjustment. This is because the revolution of the record causes the cartridge to be pulled towards the centre of the record, and the anti-skating adjustment needs to be set to provide an equivalent opposing force out towards the edge of the record, so that the inside of the stylus, and your record grooves, will wear evenly. On your Technics turntable, I think that it is set by a small control near the base (pivot point) of the tonearm (just to the right of the tonearm), which should be calibrated in grams tracking force, and which you turn so it is set to the same as the tracking force of the cartridge. It will probably also have two calibration settings – one for spherical styli (sometimes indicated by a circle symbol, or ‘S’), and one for elliptical and parabolic styli (indicated by ‘E’ or an oval symbol). Just set it based on what stylus type you have. Anti-skating can be set up more accurately using a test record, such as the excellent English Hi-fi News and Record Review/Cartridge Man (HFNRR) test record, or one of the Shure test records (widely available on Ebay). The HFNRR test record also comes with protractors to set up the cartridge properly, together with instructions on how to do it.
Exellent thankyou !
i will get to work on it now - ive been afriad to play any records for fear of damaging them 😱
thanks again !
i will get to work on it now - ive been afriad to play any records for fear of damaging them 😱
thanks again !
One thing I forgot to mention is arm height. If it is adjustable (it is on some Technics tt’s), there’ll be a small knurled screw, or something similar, on the side of the tonearm at the pivot point. Unscrew it to release the clamping mechanism, and the tonearm assembly should be able to be moved up and down. The idea is to have the arm so that when it’s playing a record, it is parallel with the record surface. That should set the vertical tracking angle (VTA) of the cartridge so that it is very close to correct (for that record – they vary a lot in thickness). Some people are very fussy about it, and like to set it up for the best sound, but given that record manufacturer’s varied the tracking angle that they cut their records at over the years, it’s always going to be a compromise. And another tip, by someone who’s old enough to have made plenty of mistakes over the years – when you’re making any setting up adjustments to your turntable, it’s best to switch the power off at the power point, before you start!
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