Kuzma SAFIR 9
- Thread starter Marcus
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A whole diff ballgame. Just 2 records in...MORE of everything with a clarity that didn't exist before !
The way I have described the Safir arm is like there's no arm at all just the cartridge floating in the groves. I thought the Safir was "end-game" for me but then I received the CS Port TAT1M2 and as big a leap as the Safir was the CS Port was another magnitude of improvements. (It vs a Kuzma Stabi R yes not in the same $$$ range but still just goes to show the differences in what tables can do al else being equal)
…I thought the same but then came the XL Air upgrade…
https://www.whatsbestforum.com/threads/kuzma-xl-air.28295/post-895870
I believe Franc has always offered the wire options you mention. The default basic is Crystal Cable Silver/Gold. The options include Cardas Clear, Crystal Cable MonoCrystal and Silver Kondo Audionote Japan. He no longer offers Nordost tonearm wire. I have the Kondo in my 4Point. When he built the 4P that I reviewed I wanted Kondo on the continuous run to the male RCA plugs and the copper Cardas to the female RCA block, so I'd have both copper and silver options. But that combo turned out to be too thick and heavy.
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Thanks, I wondered about the dual wire option. I am sure it adds mass inside the arm also, and on the Safir, I think the mass is already enough
Don't buy the dual wire option, it adds lots of high frequency problems only!Thanks, I wondered about the dual wire option. I am sure it adds mass inside the arm also, and on the Safir, I think the mass is already enough
Hi, now that I have a few listening sessions, I must say I get what the other owners are saying. It's not one thing is better, it's everything is better. I could check every box up and down the usual list.
My only quibble is, and I am suspecting this to be a cabling difference, missing some body and weight on the notes. This is a strength of the transparent cabling that I own (and not using now on this arm b/c it's hard wired with the Kondo Silver). That said, the Kondo wire is very naturally revealing, no hint of brightness, bass goes deeper than my Transparent. All of this is REALLY hard to know is it the cable? is the setup? Am I missing the easy VTA on the fly adjustment on the 4p. I think I'll start playing with VTA on diff record heights, it's not hard, loosen one screw, twist up or down, tighten one screw. This could the issue right here as I was actively using the 4p on the fly VTA adjusting...
More to come...
I spoke to my dealer, I'll start making some small VTA tweaks to see if this addresses my quibble above. He thinks it's VTA and not cabling. (he sold me the Transparent phono cabling...)
Added mass is the least of problems introduced by dual wire. The biggest issue is increased resistance to horizontal movement of the arm.Thanks, I wondered about the dual wire option. I am sure it adds mass inside the arm also, and on the Safir, I think the mass is already enough
Looking at the standard 4Point, the wire emerging from the yoke that goes into the cable will flex as the arm moves horizontally. The Safir uses a similar wiring arrangement. The weight of the yoke (which also holds the arm tube) is supported by a single point into a sapphire bearing for horizontal movement.
If the combined arm wires were thick or less flexible (or the yoke very light in weight) I can imagine how that could contribute to torque affecting tracking and anti-skate. I'm not seeing or hearing evidence of an issue in the bi-wire implementation from Kuzma. It 'seems like' the mass of the yoke is sufficient to be unaffected by the flex of the wire. The silver Kondo is four 0.05mm strands - very thin.
By the way, Stereophile had an article where you could download audio samples so you can listen to the different Kuzma wire offerings.
Do Tonearm Cables Make a Sonic Difference? You Decide!
I found with my 4Point 11" and using the excellent Wally Skater tool that the tonearm wire was having a large effect on the % anti-skating measurements and unwanted natural horizontal forces (with no anti-skating) acting upon the tonearm.
With J.R. from Wally Tools providing me with emailed guidance (and watching his excellent YouTube Wally Tools videos), from taking the tonearm wire bayonet off the 4Point 11" tonearm, disconnecting the tonearm cable from the phono stage and carefully and slowly twisting the tone arm wire and bayonet up to 360 degrees turning circle both clockwise and anti-clockwise and re-checking after each 45 degree step turn of the tonearm wire and bayonet with the tonearm being re-mounted on the Wally Skater to check the horizontal forces for each 45 degree turn, I was able to heavily reduce the unwanted horizontal forces (with the anti-skating off) and set up the % anti-skating more accurately once the natural horizontal forces of the tonearm were reduced to the lowest value I could achieve (which was quite low although not zero for the 4Point 11" tonearm).
I see from a lot of tonearm designs (both for budget and and very expensive tonearms) that this very small (in length and thickness) tonearm wire can be a flaw in the overall design and operation of the tonearm.
I can also imagine that a lot of people (me included until I bought the Wally Skater and started talking via email to J.R of Wally Tools and watching his YouTube videos) are setting up their tonearms incorrectly and therefore will most probably be operating with unwanted horizontal forces the tonearm owners (and most probably Dealers) are unaware of !
Hello jfrech.
I remember from years ago with the airline I had a similar experience with wishing for more “ meat on the bones “.
As I owned a Hagerman frybaby I went ahead and made up cables with RCA on one end and croc clips on the other, disconnecting the tonearm cable clips from the cartridge, I connected all four croc clips appropriately to the tonearm cable clips and the RCA connectors to the frybaby, at the phono stage end connected to the MM input, switched to MM ON frybaby and left for a day or two With all powered up.
This did the trick ! and more!!!
you could also put line level output through of course but you would need to connect to your preamp instead of phono stage.
Just a thought. Andmy 2 cents.
How about cartridge loading? Try bringing the load value down a bit as well as the vta. Let us know the results.
Hello all,
I was hoping those that have experience with the various Kuzma Arms could help me understand something....
If I recall correctly, when Mr Kuzma introduced the VTA tower on the 4 point, 4 point 14, and the reference 313 VTA arms that many found that to be an excellent addition, being able to adjust the VTA while playing or not with very easily and repeatably adjustments. All this, of course, without any loss of rigidity and with 0.01mm accuracy of adjustment and zero-play.
I realize that the vast majority feel that the Safir is quite superior to his other arms, However, now with the Safir, the VTA tower is no longer available. I'm wondering...
1. Why Mr Kuzma didn't include this option?
2. Do the owners of the Safir miss the ease of adjusting the VTA whether the arm is playing or stationary?
3. For those of you who once had the VTA tower, would you actually change the VTA when playing different weight records or simply leave it set in one common place? As if the novelty of the VTA tower wore off?
Thank you in advance for sharing your thoughts and experiences with me.
Best wishes,
Don
I was hoping those that have experience with the various Kuzma Arms could help me understand something....
If I recall correctly, when Mr Kuzma introduced the VTA tower on the 4 point, 4 point 14, and the reference 313 VTA arms that many found that to be an excellent addition, being able to adjust the VTA while playing or not with very easily and repeatably adjustments. All this, of course, without any loss of rigidity and with 0.01mm accuracy of adjustment and zero-play.
I realize that the vast majority feel that the Safir is quite superior to his other arms, However, now with the Safir, the VTA tower is no longer available. I'm wondering...
1. Why Mr Kuzma didn't include this option?
2. Do the owners of the Safir miss the ease of adjusting the VTA whether the arm is playing or stationary?
3. For those of you who once had the VTA tower, would you actually change the VTA when playing different weight records or simply leave it set in one common place? As if the novelty of the VTA tower wore off?
Thank you in advance for sharing your thoughts and experiences with me.
Best wishes,
Don
We discussed this earlier. Essentially your supposition of "without any loss of rigidity" associated with the VTA tower is incorrect. This is the likely reason for its omission on the Safir.
PS I, for one, only use the VTA tower on my 4P11 when initially aligning the cartridge. I would be just fine with a less convenient VTA adjustment mechanism.
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Hello bazelio,
Thank you for your reply!
To be clear, I do not currently own any of the Kuzma arms, but I am considering them for a future purchase and am trying to learn from the experiences of our forum members.
My "supposition" of when I said "... without any loss of rigidity and with 0.01mm accuracy of adjustment and zero-play." That was a direct quote that I copied and pasted from the Kuzma website. And I did notice at least one member say that there is a locking mechanism that keeps the tower rigid and fixed eliminating any play.... again, I don't own one so I don't know from personal experience.
I did read the entire thread and I did not find anywhere throughout the 19 pages, unless I missed it...
1. Why Mr Kuzma didn't include the VTA tower on the Safir arm.
2. I did see it mentioned several times that VTA is adjustable, although with more steps being needed and not possible on the fly. I noticed that some of the owners say that the sound improvement was in a different league, but I didn't find anyone that said that they miss having the tower or wished that they had the tower... just that it is more labor intensive adjusting it now. I guess what I was after is... when having the tower, would they routinely adjust the VTA when playing different thickness of records. And if so, do they still adjust the VTA now with the Safir or just leave it the same regardless of the weight of the record.
3. With your edit... you were the only person that I could find that said they only use the VTA tower at the time of initial set up and then leave it as is from there. Thank you for sharing that with me
My current arm does not have a tower, so I set my VTA to sound best for 180 gr records, as that is what I have the most of, and just leave it at that. Sometimes, I will use different thickness platter mats to compensate for the difference, but admittedly, not often.In any case, I would love to hear from more owners on their thoughts regarding if they adjust VTA accordingly to the record thickness or simply leave it alone.
Thank you and best wishes,
Don
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