ClearAudio Clever Clamp

[CarlSeibert]

I tried one of these on a lark. It looked like it would work on my Regas, with their teenie weenie stubby little spindles.

My really old Planar 3's spindle was too short even for this gizmo. But my merely old one accepts the thing just fine.

Amazingly, it actually works. It ain't no Sota Reflex Clamp but it does help bass and image focus. It costs $29 and works on spindle-challenged tables, so what's not to love?

(If you haven't seen one, it's a little clear plastic saucer that looks like it just escaped from under a cup of cafe Cubano, or maybe from being the lid for a cat food tin. I'm sure most of the 29 bucks goes to paying off the mold. I don't see much DIY potential here, but somebody with a lathe, a scrap of Lucite and a sense of humor might have a go at it.)

-Carl

[grenert]

The fly in the ointment is that the run-out groove on some records brings the stylus close enough to the center of the record that the cartridge collides with the clamp. Other than that, I think mine does a good job of holding down bowed/warped records.

[CarlSeibert]

Yipes! Thanks for mentioning that. It actually looked smaller than most clamps to me, so that thought never even dawned on me.

-Carl