MC Phono Cartridge
Shelter MC phono cartridge is divided 2 major lines. The first series is “Ultimate Line” which consists of 60t dry-carbon fiber to the housing and aiming the future of analog playback.

Another series call “Legendary Line” which is succeeding matured analog playback technology of 80’s faithfully to the current product.

Ultimate Line

The MC phono cartridge explores unknown possibility of analog playback.

Ultimate Line is extreme MC phono cartridge series, the material structure renewed after almost a quarter of century by means of adopting ultra-degree hardness dry-carbon fiber to

its housing while succeeding the fundamental motor system design philosophy of Shelter. The compression ratio of 60t class carbon fiber material used to Ultimate Line has far higher

hardness than conventional 24t dry-carbon fiber, which material is the world-first time to use the phono cartridge. In addition to the dry-carbon fiber’s original characteristic of resonance free,

high internal loss and elastic rate with superb shielding effect to external noise, the 60t carbon fiber used to Shelter Ultimate Line reproduces subtle signal without coloration and deep quietness,

and its structure is effective to all other aspects in different dimension. The flagship model of Harmony is adopting innocent solid dry-carbon fiber for entire housing and affiliated model

of Accord adopts the same material to its base plate. With adopting the leading-edge of carbon fiber technology available in Japan the Shelter MC phono cartridge explores unknown

possibility of analog playback. We hope that you enjoy to listening the new reproduction ability through Shelter Ultimate Line.

Harmony

Shelter’s flagship model, the Harmony, employs dry carbon fiber (CFRP) for the body shell. CFRP delivers a superb acoustic characteristic and is an ideal match with the newly designed motor assembly

. This combination is capable of delivering a great musical reproduction even on records with less than optimal recordings.

Dry carbon, unlike wet carbon, is designed in layers and unique molding. Harmony, utilizing the CFRP, has a compression rating of 60-tons whereas the conventional process is only 24-tons. T

he benefit is that the resonant frequency of CFRP is outside of any audible frequency. In addition, it provides a high degree of internal damping along with superb isolation characteristics

that protects the body from extraneous vibration and noise. Each of these design features ensure that the Harmony produces no coloration, and is whisper quiet and is extraordinarily

sensitive to even the most demanding and subtle musical passages.

The motor assembly is an all-new design using hard aluminum cantilever and OFC wiring. Hard aluminum allows us to firmly affix the diamond stylus tip to a rigid, yet responsive bass.

This allows the stylus to receive and reproduce every bit of information within the grooves of your favorite recordings. The length of the cantilever is slightly shorter than typical to increase

the strength to output voltage ratio. Normal aluminum cantilevers often develop a tendency to make the playback sound slightly bigger, but the stylus chip is designed to line-contact with its

curvature radius to 1.6 x 0.3mil (0.04 x 0.007mm) to achieve the best balance and increased tracking capability at the same time.

Harmony Specifications

Output voltage: 0.5mV
Stylus tip: 1.6 x 0.3mil line-contact
Impedance: 15 ohm
Weight: 8.5 gram
Tracking force: 1.4 to 2.2 gram

Compliance: 10cu

Shelter has been manufacturing high-end phono cartridges as a specialized analog audio manufacture by traditional manufacturing technique since the company was established in 1986.

All Shelter MC phono cartridges are hand-made at a workshop in Japan by adept craftsmanship, then they are all inspected and quality assured by Yasuo Ozawa himself, the designer and founder of Shelter.

The brand name of Shelter is designated with hoping that the world analog record lover who aims the summit of music playback can trust the brand and becomes a dependent on a place

(shelter) of analog audio occasionally.

The Shelter sound brightens an individuality of analog sound.

The sound timbre of audio system mirrors each owner whose values and lifestyle so it never be the same sound. Especially the analog playback is very sensitive because the sound character

immediately changes with only changing the screw which fixes the cartridge and head-shell. This means that the hobby of audio isn’t a thing to compete superior or inferior of an absolute sound,

but it is indicating just like ways of self-expression to complete the painting a piece of picture. Through the smooth and warmth sound character the Shelter phono cartridge was born to realize

the sound character that is only possible to delineate by you. The balmy sound may feel a lack for the first listening, but it doesn’t become weary for many years and there is always new discovery.

This smooth, warmth and balmy sound is what we put the true personality to the Shelter product.

Aim for true satisfaction over a long time.

Shelter MC phono cartridge avoids novel design and providing simple structure with minimum model changes, as the result the product has a long lifetime characteristic.

Moreover, we also consider to prevent sound character change occur during the product lifetime by only using carefully selected component part. In addition, as another characteristic of Shelter,

asingle individual designer supervises all products since the company establishment, also sincerely coping to the after follow of those products we sold. For example, even model 701 which

was sold in 1986, can change to current model at the cost of stylus change. We flatter ourselves that obedient and natural playback sound of Shelter phono cartridge captivates your

heart and is activating in your listening room for a long time as reference phono cartridge.

Ozwa Yasuo, the funder and designer

Born in Tokyo. He was fascinated from boyhood by the timbre of music instruments and started self-designing audio products to realize high fidelity sound reproduction. He designed many

tube amplifiers when he was in junior high school age, and majored in electrical engineering at the university with aiming an amplifier designer, but he found the charm of analog pickup which

can practice the whole design of sound reproduction that he imagines. In 1982 he joined Fidelity Research (FR) and started its career as a phono cartridge designer.

He participated to design MC phono cartridges of MCX-3, MCX-5 and other products during his work at FR. He then became independent in 1986 to establish Shelter, thereafter

he has been designing and developing the MC phono cartridge throughout his life.

• Worldwide shipment service where the Distributor or Dealer does not exist
• Free ship cost in Europe for order over 500€ (except speakers, we offer  50% of ship cost)
• Free ship cost Worldwide  for order over  2000€ (except speakers, we offer  50% of ship cost )