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DYNAVECTOR - TE KAITORA RUA PHONO CARTRIDGE

The Dynavector Te Kaitora Rua is one of our favorite cartridges!

A joint venture between Dynavector Japan and Dynavector New Zealand, in the language of the New Zealand Maori people, Te Kaitora means “The Discoverer.” Listening to this cartridge has caused us many sleepless nights, as we discover our record collections anew. The Te Kaitora Rua uncovers tremendous amounts of detail other cartridges simply cannot. Fast, open, and honest with a silky smooth top end, the Te Kaitora Rua possesses the perfect combination of detail and musicality. A slightly heavier than average cartridge at 8.8Gms, the Te Kaitora Rua is a medium compliance cartridge with a fairly low output of 0.25mV. This makes the Te Kaitora Rua compatible with the vast majority of good tonearms and turntables, but its low output will require a high quality MC phono preamp capable of 60+ dB of gain.

Reduced Weight
Every effort has been made to extract maximum performance from the Te Kaitora Rua, a titanium body, low mass coil windings and a boron cantilever with an ultra-fine line contact stylus. To reduce weight and vibration, the cartridge motor is bolted to the titanium threaded headblock; titanium was chosen primarily for its high strength and lightness; that it also adds aesthetic beauty to the cartridge was an unforeseen bonus. The Te Kaitora Rua is also a nude design; reducing overall weight, eliminating sympathetic vibration and keeping dust and debris from collecting on the moving parts.

Assembly
Dynavector chose a line contact Pathfinder (PF) stylus attached to a solid boron cantilever for the Te Kaitora Rua. The coils are of very fine copper wire wound using Dynavector founder Dr. Tominari's own proprietary coil-winding machine. This combination yields an output level of 0.25mV with a very light and agile coil assembly, making the Te Kaitora an excellent tracker and keeping the 'quick' response Dynavector cartridges are known for.

The Te Kaitora Rua has two features which help eliminate distortion. The first is readily visible on the front pole-piece, Dynavector's flux damper. Combined with the ferrous metal strips positioned around the cartridge, these two features eliminate the distortion caused by excess magnetic flux produced by the high energy Alnico magnets used in the Te Kaitora Rua, without affecting its performance or sonic character.

Specifications
Type: Low output moving coil cartridge with flux damper and softened magnetism
Output: 0.25mV ( at 1KHz, 5cm/sec)
Frequency response: 20-50,000Hz 20-20,000Hz ± 1dB
Channel balance: 1dB ( at 1KHz)
Channel separation: 30dB ( at 1KHz)
Impedance: R=4 ohms, L=10 microH
Compliance: 10 x 10-6 cm/dyne
Stylus: Line contact PF
Cantilever: 0.3mm diameter solid boron
Coils: Copper wire
Head Frame: Titanium
Weight: 8.8 grams
Tracking force: 1.8 - 2.2 grams

Dynavector products are not available for sale outside of the US!