Welcome!

Well what happened to the old arm anyway?

Methinks it was destroyed during transport because the platter was still in place, wasn't it?

Hi Jacques!

Thanks for welcoming - the old arm lost communication with the world around it - the whole turntable lost its voice so to speak. I think because of too much changing of styluses - not least by myself, I'm afraid - so it ended up with this tiny little plastic-thing holding the contacts and going into the stylus-head and holding it - it broke off. Seems like the material had "tired out". One never knows how the machine was treated by the former owners. So... I really don't understand it - but it happened under change of stylus - a change that I performed myself - with caution - I thought.

:)

Ah yes. This dreaded problem is well-documented. Even Tim Jarman talks about it in his Hifi News article (June 2014!).

Now there is no particular problem with the thin wires, they are sturdier than they look. My own Beogram 4000 was delivered to me with the carriage off its guides, and they had even resisted bad transport conditions - the French Post, which is saying something!

Q1: my piece of advice is that you should solder the wires together at one extremity. Thus you'll be able to have them make their way through.

Q2: the cartridge tags are indeed identified in the SM (6-10) so you needn't test from them from inside the arm at all!

Thanks for your ideas, Jacques!

Q1: I will certainly give this soldering solution some serious thoughts. Btw: Do you clean the insulation off the wires before soldering - or does it get burned off by itself?

About Q2. I guess I got my thinking mixed up a bit: When I mount my new (old) arm, the leads are free and can be identified by measuring - no problem. I'm afraid that I mixed this up with my wish to measure the existing defective arm (still sitting there) - just to make sure that my diagnostics on the silence of the Beogram 4000 was plausible - and that no other problem is present there. It would be nice to solve any problems while I have it all open for inspection. But you are of course right: Stripped down to simply adding the new (old) tonearm, there should be no real lead identification problem. Mea culpa!

My new (old) tonearm should arrive today, and if it has survived the Post "service" of Denmark and Sweden - apparently rather similar to the French model - I shall install it directly. In case of new mysteries popping up, I'll be back for further assistance - thank you very much for your time so far!

:)

Q1: set your iron on 400 degrees and the insulating varnish will melt.

Thanks for this advise, Jacques!

My new tonearm has arrived - seems to be unharmed.

But: This new arm has four upper contacts for the cartridge just like the old one - but two (2) lower contacts, whereas my old one had just one (1) lower contact. There are just five leads going from the socket and backwards through the arm, not six. This was a surprise. Why would the outer noise protection contact be divided into two? Is this for another model of cartridge perhaps - mine is the MMC 4000 and the MMC 20EN - both have one lower socket - which looks like it is a bit smaller in width than the two new contacts (or divided one) put together. Any suggestions? What do I do next?

:(

You've probably got a later one from a 4002 or 4004. Have you checked the corresponding service manuals?

Guess you are right. So close, yet so far.

Back to square 1. Must think.

Thanks anyway for your help this far.

:

I hear they can be adapted. Perhaps a visit on the archived forum would return a few interesting posts regarding this issue.