Reconsidering Rega Elys Cartridge

I bought my Rega P3 with an Elys cartridge and was extremely disappointed with the sound - edgy, grainy, irritating, lots of IGD. I mounted the cartridge using Rega's 3 point mount and I figured it's the way it's supposed to sound. Finally gave up and mounted a Dynavector cartridge and it was bliss from that point on. So I've been badmouthing the Elys cartridge ever since.

Fast forward a few years to last week. I Bought an inexpensive vintage Pioneer pl 112D just to play with and while setting it up I saw the box with the Elys sitting in the drawer where I keep all my set up stuff. I mounted the Elys at the recommended 49 mm from stylus to the mounting collar (which results in a Baerwald alignment) and lo and behold it sounds great!. No graininess, smooth, punchy, no IGD. What the hell? Is it possible that Rega's three point alignment is just wrong? Maybe the Elys likes the medium mass old fashioned arm of the Pioneer over the Rega arm? Scratching my head on this one.

 

Setup is a big part of the performance of turntables and cartridges. I don’t put all that much stock in forum anecdotes about how one turntable or cartridge is better than another. There’s little or no way to know if they were set up equally well. An Elys sounded good on my Rega P5. I didn’t have the same experience with it as others. I had no complaint with it.

 

I don't think that's Baerwald alignment. More likely a proprietary alignment based on Stevenson.

Does your arm pivot slope downwards toward the cartridge? If so the cartridge is too short for your Pioneer arm. You'll need a spacer to correct it for optimal setup - you just put it between the cart and headshell.

As for why it sounds better on the Pioneer, no idea. What is the mass on the old Pioneer arm? It might be a little heavier than the Rega arm which accounts for some of the difference in performance.

 

No, it is a Baerwald alignment. I checked it against two Baerwald alignment protractors. The tonearm looks parallel to the record to me so I don't think any spacers are needed. In fact like I said it sounds wonderful so I'm not going to screw around with the setup but still wondering why it sounds great on this tonearm turntable and it doesn't on the P3. Here are the Pioneer tonearm specs I could find in Vinyl Engine - Effective length: 221m, Overhang: 15.5mm, Usable cartridge weight: 4 to 10g. No mention of effective mass but I remember reading somewhere that these inexpensive mid 70's Japanese turntables had "medium mass" tonearms whatever that means.

 

Baerwald usually has the cartridge sit farther forward in the headshell - the overhang is longer. If the cartridge is square and has an overhang like what you listed with an arm length like that it's a Stevenson based alignment. So either the protractor is wrong or something else is wrong. Medium mass could mean anything. Some 70s tonearms on Japanese tables might be like 12g, whereas others like my JVC is 21g.

 

Specs of 221 mm effective length and 15.5 mm overhang indicate a pivot-to-spindle distance of 205.5 mm. Baerwald overhang on that turntable would be 18.5 mm. Stevenson would be 16.5. Pioneer overhang is even shorter than Stevenson.

 

Well, when I move the tonearm over the center spindle I measure 18.5 mm from the stylus to the center of the spindle so Baerwald it is. Now that that's settled, any theories as to why the Pioneer arm makes the Elys cartridge sound so much better than the Rega arm? Has anyone else had a similar experience?

 

Then your overhang is wrong per Pioneer method if you want align per the gauge. Here are some stats for you. These are generated using the very accurate Conrad Hoffman program. A lot of people don't know how to use this right. The put the effective length where the pivot to spindle distance needs to go.

Null points are DIN standards for these calculations:

Lofgren A: 17.5 overhang, Null: 63, 119

Lofgren B: 18 overhang, Null 67.4, 114.8

Stevenson: 15.5 overhang, Null 57.5, 115.5

As you can see Stevenson overhang is the shortest of the bunch. Baerwald is based on Lofgren, and those alignments usually require twisting the cart in the headshell towards the spindle, whereas Stevenson is straight. Stevenson optimizes for the lowest distortion at the end of the record. The others give lower average distortion across the whole record.

So something you did is off. If you are getting 18.5 overhang measured from the spindle to the stylus tip, then your use of the gauge is wrong. Get an accurate ruler, lay the cartridge and headshell on its side. Then measure. Of course this assumes your headshell is a standarized dimension and not something funky.

 

OP: "Hey, I'm getting better sound!"
Reply: "No, you're doing it wrong."

Only our hobby is this dumb.

 

Indeed. It really is kind of amusing. Oh well.

 

I never tried the Elys2 on any other deck. Hated it so bad I tossed it in the drawer without another thought. So there’s no IGD? That was the worst part on the Rega.

 

idk why people are having brainfarts here. you can get (almost) any alignment on any TT/arm combo, by moving the cartidge around. OP is saying he got got it aligned to baerwald, nothing complicated about that.

As for why it sounds better... some arm/cartridge combos just work, even when the numbers say they won't.

 

When I was using an Elys on a Rega turntable I aligned it to Baerwald. I tried the Rega method and got better results with Baerwald. Sometimes between forces, and horizontal angles, and vertical angles, the stars seem to align. A perfectly set up turntable can sound better than one that is not perfectly set up. And the numbers can’t always predict where that perfection will land.

 

Not sure why it never occurred to me to ditch the third screw and treat it like any other cart! Duh!