Who Is In The Linear Tracking Club?

[Grainger49]

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.

[earwaxxer]

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.

[4krow]

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

[Paully]

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.

[BNAL]

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 

[Grainger49]

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?

[Chris]

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....

[BNAL]

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.

[earwaxxer]

A TON Eric? or a metric ton?

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!

[Paully]

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.

[Chris]

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...

[Chris]

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...

[BNAL]

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.

[4krow]

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.

[Grainger49]

I think we are going to have to start including pictures.  Anyone who wants to host an image can check the FAQ Thread I have stickeyed in my corner.