Sibilance on Project Turntable

[oldleodensian]

I bought a brand new Xpression II turntable a few months ago, with factory fitted OM10 cartridge, and ocassionally detected some sibilance, until a couple of days ago played an album where the last 2 tracks on both sides are horribly sibilant, very pronounced ssss in vocals that are clear on the CD version.

Could this be that the factory-set geometry needs adjusting??

I am a novice when it comes to altering anything other than basics, like the counterweight!

Any ideas/advice appreciated.

 

[Anonymous]

check tracking weight and anti skate i usually put the tracking weight at the heavier end of the range

also use the protractor to check the cartridge is aligned correctly

 

[Henley]

Does, indeed, sound more like insufficient tracking weight. Set it to 1.8g (18mN)

 

[oldleodensian]

Thanks to oneoff and henley for the advice.

Cartridge alignment checked with 2 point protractor that came with turntable and seems to be correct.

Checked out tonearm balances out and reset the tracking weight (to 18).

Not much difference, though perhaps slightly better.

Suppose I will have to listen to a few more final tracks on albums, see if it is a problem with this LP. It is an 80's pressing, bought 2nd hand, but vinyl has been cleaned properly twice and otherwise sounds clean and clear. It's just a pain to listen to 2 songs (last tracks on both sides) that have lots of sss in the choruses.

 

[fatboyslimfast]

Try some different albums - I have two copies of the same album, one looks a bit scratched, the other looks mint.

The mint one sounds awfully distorted - I reckon someone played it with a damaged stylus at some point. The scratched one bizarrely sounds fine (apart from the occasional pop)...

 

[Henley]

oldleodensian:
Thanks to oneoff and henley for the advice.

Cartridge alignment checked with 2 point protractor that came with turntable and seems to be correct.

Checked out tonearm balances out and reset the tracking weight (to 18).

Not much difference, though perhaps slightly better.

Suppose I will have to listen to a few more final tracks on albums, see if it is a problem with this LP. It is an 80's pressing, bought 2nd hand, but vinyl has been cleaned properly twice and otherwise sounds clean and clear. It's just a pain to listen to 2 songs (last tracks on both sides) that have lots of sss in the choruses.

It does sound more like a problem with the pressing. If other albums are fine then this is almost certain. the thing is that tracking error is always at its greatest toward the centre of the record so any pressing faults will be magnified.