Ortofon OM 5E bottoming out at 1.75 grams?

[Reticuli]

My tonearm(s) are level.

Both the 5E tips I got are slightly bottoming out occassionally on imperfect (mildly warped or noncentered hole) records or if I just hit stop/play when set to the "optimal" 1.75 grams. Is that normal? I'm not sure if it's affecting the sound, or not, but I can see that it's either touching or almost touching. There is little to no light showing through underneith at times when it's playing and I've got a flashlight behind it.

I find they do not do that at 1.5 grams, but the sound is less warm, more unkempt, and there is the beginnings of frequency intermodulation distortion in the highs on very loudly mastered pressings. Is it better to live with a little bottoming out to the metal plate on the bottom of the OM from time to time, or should I be just getting used to the tone and distortion at 1.5 grams?

To be fair, the sound is not as overly bright at 1.5 grams as the Stanton 500EmkII and at that weight it's about the same FIM distortion as the 680EL at 1.825 grams...still very good. But on perfect records, the OM 5E is so neutral and supremely undistorted at 1.75 grams...and yes I tested with the Hi Fi News Test Record.

Geez, I'm a little conflicted here, and my Rek-o-Cut downforce scale is difficult to give me 1.625 grams precisely to try something in between. Tempted to try that downforce, but I'm surprised I'm getting any bottoming out at anywhere inside the recommended 1.5-2g range.

[JohnMichael]

My tonearm(s) are level.

Both the 5E tips I got are slightly bottoming out occassionally on imperfect (mildly warped or noncentered hole) records or if I just hit stop/play when set to the "optimal" 1.75 grams. Is that normal? I'm not sure if it's affecting the sound, or not, but I can see that it's either touching or almost touching. There is little to no light showing through underneith at times when it's playing and I've got a flashlight behind it.

I find they do not do that at 1.5 grams, but the sound is less warm, more unkempt, and there is the beginnings of frequency intermodulation distortion in the highs on very loudly mastered pressings. Is it better to live with a little bottoming out to the metal plate on the bottom of the OM from time to time, or should I be just getting used to the tone and distortion at 1.5 grams?

To be fair, the sound is not as overly bright at 1.5 grams as the Stanton 500EmkII and at that weight it's about the same FIM distortion as the 680EL at 1.825 grams...still very good. But on perfect records, the OM 5E is so neutral and supremely undistorted at 1.75 grams...and yes I tested with the Hi Fi News Test Record.

Geez, I'm a little conflicted here, and my Rek-o-Cut downforce scale is difficult to give me 1.625 grams precisely to try something in between. Tempted to try that downforce, but I'm surprised I'm getting any bottoming out at anywhere inside the recommended 1.5-2g range.




In order to help I would like to know what turntable and tonearm are you using with that cartridge. I also wonder what you mean about bottoming out? In my mind bottoming out would mean the stylus and cantilever are being pushed up into the cartridge and the cartridge body is dragging. I own several cartridges and with some it is easier to see the stylus when the record is playing than with others. When I play a warped record the arm moves up and down to follow the warp but it does not interfere with the music.

Ortofon suggests tracking force of 1.75 grams as you say and I find Ortofon accurate in their specs. I currently have my OM 20 mounted and it performs very well.

Welcome to AudioReview and we will try to help.

[Reticuli]

Thanks for responding. Sorry, by bottoming out I mean when the bottom of the cart appears to have no space between it and the record surface. I'm not sure if it's actually physically touching, but there is little to no space there at times when shining a flashlight behind it. Again, I can't be certain how much it is affecting the sound or if it is truly "dragging", but it's definitely close.

My resonant frequency for the arm is currently around 8-10hz, with the potential to remove one of the tonearm weights and the bronze colored OM cart weight if I want to raise the frequency, but the bass is fine and it's not jumping gooves from warps, footsteps, or the start/stop, so I don't think it's necessary yet. It seems to be a good compliance/mass match for my DJ tables I'm using these to do listening and basic playback on.

The tonearm height is fully adjustable, but the arms are level right now, so that's not the issue...unless you think I should add VTA over level? Maybe the arms are slightly less level during minor warps, but visually I don't see enough change occuring to justify it even on the worst records. I chose the 5E tips because I already had OM carts for djing purposes.

Your 20E has 25% more compliance and you're fine at 1.5 grams?

[Reticuli]

Ahhh...maybe I DO need to remove that tonearm mass so the arm will move with the slight warps better, not less? Less mass means it will move more easily WITH the form of the record. There's no danger of moving up into the bass range and getting low-end cracking on me or the beat causing the whole cart to leap out of the groove. It is at the bottom of the acceptable resonance range already...hmm.

Edit:

So I went ahead and removed the 7 gram S-weight from behind the counterweight and the OM's brass colored 2 gram weight. I also cut the screws on the headshell to shorten them, though that was probably more trouble than it was worth given the imperfect ends and difficulty in getting the bolts back on. Youch...that's for my neck and arm.

Funny, when staying at 1.5 grams briefly, the counterweight only needed to be moved like a degree of rotation towards the joint to get it after the two weights had been removed (and the headshell aftermath corrected). Proof of moments and lever vectors of forces for you: 7 grams on the short end, 2 grams on the long end. Going to 1.75 grams only required a few degrees more. From DJ arm to hifi arm. That's synergy!

Did it improve anything? Well, the resonant frequency moved up and begins earlier, around 13hz, but still continues until about 7hz. The arm does noticeably seem to move more with the record. However, it still seems like I'm a paper thickness (or two) away from bottoming out all the time even if it isn't actually doing so except in the most extreme cases.

1.625 grams is looking a lot better to me for a try. I also might go about getting some Pro concords to use when DJing (and not using the fragile 5E) so I can just pop those ones on (with the NCE or Pro tips ) and then just put the 7 gram S-weight back on (easy) to add mass for the lower compliance. I wonder if the concords have more mass like using the brass weight or less like without it...

If I want the Super OM, I'm definitely going for the NCE mkII Concord body, as I'm sick of screwing around with headshells. It's disappointing Ortofon is price gauging on it, though, considering how inexpensive the Super OM 10E is going for nowadays. Damn I got taken on the orginal NCEs a few years ago. Almost $300 for cheap-to-build carts with DJ tips!

Anyway, I think I'm wanting some tubes for my phono stages, now. The TCC cheapo discrete phono stage isn't electrically matched to the Ortofon and it's a tad edgy. My Xone board's phonos are 330pF, so that's even worse for them. The adjustable ART is otherwise appropriate, but more solid state and cheapness scares me with the OM leanness.

[Reticuli]

Last night I was a bit disappointed with the new 1.75 gram downforce sound on the 5E with 9 grams less tonearm mass. It sounded compressed, constrained, closed in, not effortless, and had a grain to the sound. For lack of a better guess, I thought perhaps the carts were weighted properly with the 9 grams of mass on at 1.75 grams downforce, but now might be overweighted for the arm. Considering how close to bottoming out the carts were anyway, I decided to try 1.5 grams at this current lower tonearm mass. Yes, the arms are moving with the record more either way with the lower mass.

I had not actually listened at 1.5 grams since I'd removed the mass. I'd just checked skating and was impressed how little rotation the counterweight needed to get back to 1.5. Well, I put it back to that downforce and it's definitely the ticket. The unkempt, uncontrolled, loose sound of the carts at 1.5 grams with the higher arm mass is now fine with a lighter arm at that same downforce. Fairly neutral, delicate, open, and dynamic. The arm moves even more easily with the record than at 1.75 grams, yet does not do anything weird from the music itself. I am a comfortable distance from bottoming out, even on warped records.

I've been looking at the Shure m97xE and the AT 440ml, but I don't think I want to bother with carts that have such expensive replacement tips. Done, done, and done.

[simmel]

We still don't know what turntable and arms you are using ???

It also sounds like you Have a lot of crap records as well. If they are that warped and shot I wouldn't play them on a decent HiFi system with a good cartridge, maybe a bog standard heavyweight turntable and arm would be better for your DJing.

Only my opinion.

[Reticuli]

Why would I want a heavyweight arm when I'm using high compliance styli now? The whole point of removing the secondary counterweight and the OM brass weight was to match them up. It's as right as rain, now. Get the arm as low swing-mass as possible while still not going so low that the bass breaks up on your records with the deepest low end. Works for me. I am definitely through with screwing around with "durable" thick cantilevers that can't reproduce highs this accurately, let alone ones that sell at outrageous "DJ" prices for such low fidelity junk. Leave that to scratchers and suckers.