Тонармы — Clearaudio SATISFY KARDAN

The Satisfy Kardan is a 9-inch arm made by the Erlangen analogue firm Clearaudio, and as the German word Kardan indicates, it is gimbal-mounted on two axes rather than resting on a single pivot point. Clearaudio builds it with bearings sourced from the German watch industry and aims it at many turntables and cartridges. It comes with an aluminium tube in silver or black, with a carbon tube, or as the all-black Satisfy Kardan Signature.

Key specs that matter

Effective length is 239.12 mm at a mounting distance of 222 mm from pivot to spindle, and overhang is 17.12 mm. The offset angle is 24.02 degrees, and the arm measures 305 mm from end to end. It balances cartridges weighing between 2.5 g and 17.0 g. With counterweight fitted, the aluminium and Signature versions weigh about 490 g, while the carbon version comes in at about 480 g. Signal leaves through a 1.1 m Clearaudio Direct Wire PLUS lead finished with MPC RCA connectors. The bearing housing and fittings use aluminium and stainless steel, and Clearaudio covers the arm for two years after registration within 14 days.

Engineering and use context

In the vertical axis a polished tungsten shaft runs in precisely balanced sapphire bearings, and the horizontal bearings are made of hard-wearing ceramic. Anti-skating works magnetically and is set and locked with a set screw that is easy to reach from the side of the bearing housing. Azimuth is adjusted through the aluminium headshell that comes pre-mounted on the tube. The feature Clearaudio emphasises most is continuous direct wiring, meaning that the audio signal runs from the cartridge through the whole tonearm to the phono preamplifier without any physical break, and the company calls this unusual for an arm at this price. Aluminium and carbon tubes are both chosen to combine stiffness with resonance-optimised material properties, and the carbon one saves about 10 g.

Pairing

A lower balance limit of 2.5 g lets the arm take very light cartridges as well as typical MM designs such as the 8.4 g Clearaudio Artist V2 or the 7 g Stradivari V2 moving-coil model, up to a 17 g ceiling. Because the lead runs uninterrupted to the phono stage, the Direct Wire PLUS cable plugs straight into the input of a preamplifier with its MPC RCA plugs. On non-Clearaudio decks the arm board has to be prepared for the specified distance between pivot and spindle.

Alternatives

The Clearaudio Profiler combines features of the Satisfy Kardan and Tracer ranges with a horizontal sapphire and vertical ball bearing and a 3.5 to 17 g balance range.