THE TERMINATOR TONEARM – budget cost, high end performance!
Read Clive Meakins 'Enjoy The Music' Review
The Evolution tonearm has undergone a revolution: its been turned upside-down, & transformed into The Terminator!
Turning the original design on its head has improved the air cushion efficiency.
Air now remains trapped under the sliding saddle for longer resulting in better floating requiring less air flow. This reduces pump noise & hiss from the airbearing, which is now inaudible.
With its underslung carriage, the wand is now below the centre of gravity thus increasing its stability. This gives better tracking with high compliance, low vertical tracking force cartridges.
It will now also fit Turntables with the shallowest of platters.
In addition, a new cantilevered universal mounting system will allow Terminator to fit onto any TT provided with a hole for a conventional pivot arm.
Note: If the hole does not fall within the marked area, an adaptor plate can be supplied.
The single point fixing is easy to align. Simple thumbscrew adjustments for VTA & level make setting up for different cartridges a doddle! See mounting instructions here.
However, the BIGGEST single advantage of this new design is the tonearm can be suspended OVER the platter. This results in a short wand with an effective length of only 6" total length & a typical weight with cartridge & counterweight of less than 80g.
Keeping the wand short reduces resonances within the arm which typically colours the music. It is probably one of the major influences contributing to the overall sound of a tonearm. Manufacturers of conventional pivoted arms go to great lengths to try to eliminate resonances. They have a hard job!
Together with a lightweight slider, Terminator has the lowest lateral inertia of ANY airbearing tonearm on the market weighing in at under 130g including the saddle, allowing safe tracking of the fussiest high compliant cartridge. The lateral mass can be easily increased to suit high mass cartridges by simply adding a brass weight to the saddle.
Another important modification was moving the cueing device from the front to the back. This allows uncluttered access to placing the record on the deck as well as cleaning up the aesthetics.
CONSTRUCTION
Simplicity is the keyword. Keeping it simple keeps the cost down. The mounting plate uses thick 6mm aluminium angle section connected to a hardwood mounting block by a single screw. This simple method of coupling allows the wooden block to swivel, move up & move down. The airbearing assembly is glued & screwed to the top of this block. Air is supplied to the airbearing by a channel cut through this block.
There is no fancy finishing, again to keep the cost down. That does not mean the Terminator is not good looking! It just doesn't have a mass production factory look about it. Everything is finished with coarse lapping, apart from the air bearing surfaces which are anodised. The pictures you see here are a pre-production model. Final models with have a CNC engineered finish!
SOUND
Improvements over the Evo can be summarised as:
Crunchingly powerful bass with not a trace of overhang
Impactful dynamics, really fast
Greater separation of instruments
Huge vocals
Increased stage width
Advantages
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Dramatic improvement in sound
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Fits any deck, no matter how low the platter is.
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Single point fixing adjustable for height, tilt & horizontal alignment.
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Carrier overhangs record allowing easier set-up positioning.
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Shorter wand resulting in less vertical mass
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Less prone to dust collection
Disadvantages
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Needs mounting hole thru plinth
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Will only fit in one position on plinth
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Changing arm wand slightly trickier
A few pics of the pre-production model!
