A ‘smarter’ kind of record weight…
By Roy Gregory
For British audiophiles of a certain age, record clamps and, in particular, record weights will forever be viewed with a sceptical eye. In a land where lightweight, three-point suspended turntables were the ne plus ultra of LP replay, dumping anything of appreciable mass on top of the record was going to upset the suspension: the heavier the additional weight (and the lower the suspended mass) the greater the problem. That ruled out pretty much all of the available record clamps, while record weights were considered the spawn of the devil.
Unlike most of my countrymen, I abandoned the lightweight, suspended turntable early, moving to progressively heavier and less nervous record players. For around 25-years, my ‘tables of choice came from VPI, first the HW19, then various TNT models and, finally, the Classics – 1, 4 and Direct. Each and every one came equipped with a screw-down clamp and/or a record weight, so I got thoroughly used to the idea of mechanically damping the vinyl disc. It’s a habit that remains ingrained. The GPA Monaco has a clever, pressure sensitive screw clamp, with a central LED that illuminates to indicate optimum clamping pressure. I use Kuzma’s Ebony clamp (more properly, a weight) on the Stabi M and the Stillpoints Record Weight (more or less a thinner ultra 5 with a spindle hole drilled through its middle) on my various VPIs. So, philosophically at least, asking me to look at an alternative record weight is like pushing at an open door. But, when that record weight comes with a price-tag bordering on £3,000, even someone as insensitive to price as the average audio reviewer is apt to pause. But that’s what Arya Audio Labs (best known for the RevOpod equipment feet) are asking for their Orbius record weight – and doing it with a dead straight face!
By now, you’ll probably be assuming that this is no ordinary record weight – and you’d be right. Not only is the Orbius more complex and unquestionably more beautiful than the average record weight, it also promises to do more than just weight your records. Like many a record clamp/weight before it, the Orbius includes a central bubble level and a strobe function for setting speed. But while neither facility is new, Arya Audio Labs can make a serious claim as to the superior accuracy of their implementation. But before we get into that, I should explain the structure and materials employed in the weight itself.
The body of the clamp consists of two main elements: an 80mm diameter alloy core which is combined with a separate, heavily machined and fluted grip ring to. The top of the core carries the bubble scale and the clever strobe patterns, of which more later. Flip it over and you discover that it is essentially hollow, with a well that’s 50mm in diameter and up to 32mm deep, depending on which version of the you are looking at, machined into its underside. Version? Yes. The Orbius is available in anything up to 12 different specs, if you include the choice of black and chrome or all-black finish. There are two different, weighted inserts and three different spindle heights, each accommodated by a progressively deeper base below the knurled section of the body.
