Wow. Perhaps scrape the cantilever and pins with an Exacto knife. You would have to have super vision to clean the cantilever and be so careful with applying too much pressure that could bend it. Perhaps a chemical would clean the cantilever.
Hoping it was a protective coating from the factory but neither isopropyl alcohol or rubbing with a pencil eraser had and effect
These are representative of the Es and LTs I have. The crystalline growth is a royal pain to get off. I've had more than a few 30+ year old NOS cartridges where I had to scrape the tip of the stylus under a microscope to clear it so it'd sit in the groove right. The first play of my XL88-D I thought it was a dud, but that was the issue. Thankfully! Excuse the motion blur - it's not a rig that's conducive to "casual" shots. Full size: Dropbox - R5__3408.JPG - Simplify your life Full size: Dropbox - R5__3419.JPG - Simplify your life
Mine came with a dead left channel and the side that was working didn’t sound nearly as good at the 2m blue it replaced.
The E isn’t bad enough to bother me either. It’ll clean up well enough and I don’t any spots that are eaten away. I’d prefer it to not be much worse, that’s for sure.
Based on what @needlestein and others have reported here, I’m glad I ended up with a relatively clean and fully functional LT. Mine looked a bit cleaner than the one @JP photographed above. The cantilever was free of any corrosion, and while the pins were not perfect they were decent enough. There’s always some risk with cartridges that are 40+ years old, but I’ve had good luck. I’ve yet to come across a Stanton or Pickering with a bad suspension or dead channel. I’ve heard anecdotally that some Shure V15 suspensions hardened and were unusable. How these things were stored will certainly play a part.
My E and LT that were ordered and shipped out 2-3 weeks ago were perfectly like new. Waiting for my 2nd E that was one of the final orders on ebay.
They were all stored identically in a large box, with maybe 25 to a box in smaller boxes with foam rubber cells. The only thing in direct contact with the carts was the foam rubber which had deteriorated somewhat over the decades and became crumbly and somewhat gooey. Personally, I wouldn't mess with trying to clean anything except for the signal pins on the back.
I literally just went to look at the LT I have that isn't mounted right now and it looks as new as my nagaoka except it's like 30 yrs older maybe. I just brushed the E and LT with my camera carbon fibre brush upon unboxing them and they def look like it was made yesterday. Fingers crossed for the other E I ordered fairly recently.
It’s weird how just the rear millimeter and a half of the pins corroded—and the pins themselves don’t seem to have corroded much as they clean up fine. Definitely less shiny after the cleanup as my LTs which were all flawless like the day they were made. Too bad about the cantilevers on the Es. Still happy enough to have them that I will keep them.
Thanks all for the recommendations. Tested on my RadioShack MM and all is good. Since it's a gift, waiting on a set of headshell screws to arrive and will be placing the cartridge in a presentation box, from one of my previous cartridges that has the two headshell holes to so it's a presentable gift. Why? because the misses said so. I'll break the news that the cartridge could be 40 years old after it's installed. Will report back on the sonic attributes after it's connected. Woohoo.