Technology · Principles

From the
groove out

A stylus tracking a groove begins a mechanical and acoustic journey. These are the principles that decide, at each junction, whether the signal is carried faithfully or coloured.

Geometry
The stylus should sit where the arm pivots. A raised headshell places the stylus tip on the horizontal bearing axis, so a warped record produces pure vertical motion — without the lateral coupling that conventional geometry introduces into every rotation of the platter.
Energy
A tonearm's job is to hold the cartridge still and let unwanted energy leave. A power-law tapered composite tube with an internal transmission-line bore conducts vibration away and dissipates it, rather than storing it and reflecting it back into the groove.
Bearings
Motion should be free in the directions it is meant to be, and rigid in every other. Matched precision bearings in an offset gimbal are preloaded to remove play without adding friction, so each axis constrains only its intended movement — no cross-axis coupling.
Tracking Force
Downforce is set by pure static balance — gravity, not a spring. A spring adds a variable that changes with arm position, with temperature, and with age. Removing it means the force at the stylus stays constant as the record rises and falls.
Anti-Skate
Correction should be set once and stay set. A refined mechanical dial replaces the thread-and-knot arrangements that creep and drift over years of use, holding its calibration for the working life of the arm.
Materials
Carbon composite, brass and precision alloys are chosen for how they manage energy and how they endure — measured across decades of ownership — rather than for how they look in a photograph.
On honesty

Bisono does not claim to reveal “what the artist intended.” No component can, and the phrase belongs to marketing rather than engineering.

The claim is narrower and testable: fewer compromises between the groove and your system. Every decision here is made to serve that, and documented so it can be questioned.

See it in the Stratos