Necromancy

I recently acquired a butchered cantilever-less Denon DL-103LC II cartridge.

I thought I would give a rebuild a go.

I had a dead Rega Bias 2 cartridge that I could use for a donor cantilever. I snipped it off with some micro scissors, ensuring the length was correct. I then opened up the inside of the cantilever that had been slightly crushed during the cut using my micro broaches that I have. These are pretty small, the internal diameter of the cantilever is 0.3mm, but I was successful.

In my youth I was an adept modeller and figure painter, and these days I set up and repair many small things anyway so working in this scale isn’t too difficult.

The cantilever must have completely snapped or fallen off at some point as there was a small shank left on the cartridge.

I sourced some micro tubing and crafted a splint to mount internally to the cantilever and into the hole left on the cartridge. This was much easier than I thought it would be.

Where it got difficult was ensuring that the stylus was completely aligned so as to ensure correct channel balance. I essentially did it by eye, using some reference gridlines. To be fair, I wasn’t expecting success at all and would have been happy if I managed to even get a noise out of the franken-cartridge I was creating.

Once I had gotten the cantilever in the right place I mixed up some jewellers epoxy and glued it in place. I fitted the nude cartridge to a wooden body that I have had in my bits box for years and then mounted it into the Technics for a listen. This is running through my Fonolab transformer at the moment and should be a good match for the Denons 13Ω impedance. I will of course experiment with my Silvercore one as well.

I set the tracking weight at 2.5 grams and was pleasantly surprised by really good sound! The Rega cantilever and stylus combination are an improvement on the Denon original being an elliptical profile as opposed to the standard original spherical one. I will check the channel balance with my Fozgometer when I get a chance.

I have acquired a few more dead MC cartridges to try and revive, and I have all the tools necessary to do it now, including a microscope. Next time I will take better pics, and I have some ideas around adhesives to use as well. For my first proper retip, I’m pretty pleased with the result, and hopefully will only improve from here. It’s really cool to be able to revive a dead piece of micro engineering and fun to do as well.

I have to thank the Groovetickler himself Joeseph Long for his tips and advice in this endeavour. Top dude and super knowledgeable.

Addendum: This morning I added a new dust shroud around the generator as the original was pretty ragged.

Denon DL-103LC II specs:

Output: 0.25mV
Frequency response: 20-45kHz
Internal resistance: 13Ω
Needle pressure: 2.5± 0.3g
Weight: 8.5g

A limited-edition released to commemorate the 75th anniversary of Japanese Columbia. The 103 series is upgraded again, and the internal resistance is higher purity linear single crystal copper (LC-OFC), which further inhibits the loss of playback signal. The impedance is also reduced to 13 ohms, which is more sensitive and more dynamic, far exceeding 103R.