Hi ddk
I was skeptical at first and thought to myself, how do I figure out the torque specs for each cartridge?
I asked Dietrich Brakemeier, if you don’t know who Dietrich is, he is a brilliant German engineer who designed the SMARTractor protractor which is arguably the best and most accurate protractor you could buy. He also is the designer of the Axiom tonearm that many audiophiles feel is one of the best tonearms out there, not to mention his Apolyt turntable that sells for several hundred thousand dollars etc.
He explained it to me like this, the cartridge has nothing to do with it. It’s the bolt that secures the cartridge to the tonearm, specifically the bolt material.
There are many different types of cartridge bolts that can be used to secure the cartridge to the tonearm. They all have different weights and torque specs. Some examples are, aluminum, brass, stainless steel, nylon, titanium just to name a few. All of these materials have different torque specs that can be found in engineering journals. Dietrich has done extensive research on all of them. He feels that making sure the bolts are torqued to the correct spec and that they are evenly torqued is not only audible buy very important for the best energy transfer. He feels titanium is the best material for proper energy transfer.
So, it has nothing to do with all the variables you mentioned in your post, it’s all about the bolt material. Once that was explained to me, it made perfect sense. Take care.
Best regards
Scot
P.s. for those interested, Acoustical Systems (Dietrich’s website) sells titanium cartridge bolts. TECHDAS used to but they no longer do for whatever reason.