StylusTimer Counts Your Groove Time

Now you can accurately track the amount of groove time and the ‘age’ of your cartridge with this odometer-like vinyl gadget

Created by Don Lindich, he created the StylusTimer after finding himself with an itch that he couldn’t scratch.

“My $650 cartridge was three years old and I had no idea how many hours were on my stylus,” he told me. “I looked around and absolutely nothing existed that was suitable for the purpose of recording stylus hours over the months and years.”

So he went ahead and created the StylusTimer to do just that.

“I identified what was needed for a stylus chronograph – it would only record hours,” he said, “it would tell you when it was operating (a flashing H,) it would prevent accidental resets so you don’t lose the time if you push the wrong button (it requires you to holds the reset button down for over three seconds to reset it) and it would remember the time when you change the battery.”

He started with an existing timer shell to keep costs down but the display and electronics inside are proprietary and not available anywhere else. Actually, I did check this. I looked online and all over those cheap Chinese websites where timers like this tend to congregate and, sure enough, couldn’t find that did the job. Not in the same way, anyhow.

I do recall that Pickering used to make something similar, way back in the midst of time but there’s been nothing like it for a while now.

You can grab one yourself via Tonar International at tonar.eu and they will direct you to a dealer to purchase it.