Digital Scale

[Mike]

I have the older Ortofon Digital Scale and find it very accurate (especially compared to the cheap Chinese ones).

This new scale from Ortofon looks interesting:

http://www.ortofon.com/ds-3-digital-...e-p-708-n-3444


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[puroagave]

Mike, I use the exact same scale. Its actually made in Japan for Ortofon. Mine works well but will give me different reads depending on where the stylus rests on it. it doesn't vary more than two or three hundreths of a gram - which is totally acceptable.

[audio.bill]

Can't be 100% certain it's exactly the same, but it sure looks a lot like this scale with the simple addition of a weighing platform.

[Mike]

You're right Bill.


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[puroagave]

Can't be 100% certain it's exactly the same, but it sure looks a lot like this scale with the simple addition of a weighing platform.

it does look alike. you'll get a more accurate read of VTF when the stylus is as close to the playing surface as possible. this scale lacks the facility to do that. the work around would be to raise the arm everytime you adjust VTF by 0.8" to compensate for the thickness of the scale. that would be pain to do.

[jdandy]

I own two stylus force gauges, the Shure SFG-2 stylus force gauge and the Audio Additives digital stylus force gauge. Surprisingly, the Shure SFG-2 measured within 0.1 gram of the calibrated Audio Additives digital gauge. I have owned the SFG-2 for 30 years and it still works like a charm. I use the Audio Additives digital gauge now for it's extreme accuracy. I like both of them.


Audio Additives Digital Stylus Force Gauge





Shure SFG-2 Stylus Force Gauge

[audio.bill]

For the DIY inclined among us, with some basic experimentation you can create a non-magnetic weighing platform using either a plastic gift card or thin piece of aluminum. Just bend into the desired shape so that it has a section to sit flat on the scale's weighing platform, then bends down 90 degrees to achieve the proper height just above the bottom of the base, and then bend out a section to form the platform for the stylus. You can use some double stick tape to secure the platform to the scale and you're all set. Just experiment to ensure you have the bends formed at the proper distances to achieve the desired height for the stylus before you tape it in place, or else you may damage the scale by trying to remove and replace the platform. The 'Tare' function of these scales allows you to zero it out with the platform in place.

[audio.bill]

Here's a link to another really good quality scale that can be used in a similar fashion to create a tracking force scale. There's a company selling these on Audiogon with a bent aluminum platform retailing at $250 and selling for $179. http://www.thedigitalscale.com/proscale-lc50.html

[A/V Solutions]

The DS-3 scale has been around for many years and distributed by Ortofon Japan and Ortofon Denmark but was intended for the Asia and European markets only.....the DS-1 has been distributed by Ortofon USA and was intended for the US market only. Looks like there ditching the DS-1 in favor of the new improved DS-3 version. I own both for many years with out issue and both are accurate, I prefer the DS-3 because of the extra digit.

The DS-1 reads 0.1 as the DS-3 reads 0.01. Both scales are made in Japan and accurate, for consistent readings take a sharpie and mark a dot on the platform and land the stylus on the dot.