Blue Angel Mantis cartridge

摘要

Conditioning dictates that if someone claims to have made something from scratch, odds are it's a speaker. With all due respect to speaker builders of repute, there's nothing easier than shoving drivers in a box and calling one's self 'a manufacturer.' But I genuinely cannot remember the last time I was told by someone that he had made an all-new phono cartridge. And from South Africa, to boot. Let's qualify this: Andre Hanekom, in addition to being a music lover and audiophile, has a background that lends itself to fashioning his own cartridge. For many years the South African distributor of a handful of watch brands, with mechanical skills of his own, Andre was not put off by micro-mechanics. And herein lies a tale, as much inspirational as cautionary, for all you would-be Joe Grados.