Discussions on Cartridge Alignment

For Vinyl and Record lovers: turntables, cartridges, etc.

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Postby audiophileman2002 » Tue May 22, 2007 2:21 am

I have to qualify that all the points raised pertain only to Moving Coil Cartridges.
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Postby mandym » Tue May 22, 2007 7:00 am

Relative to SRA numerically duplicating changes in VTA:

arnoldc wrote:No, I don't think so.


Arnold=1

Opposition=3 +1 (count me in too).

The opposition wins by a landslide :wink: :wink: . Now, I really think this thread ought to be locked before reason kneels to EGO :evil: :evil:



,
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Postby arnoldc » Tue May 22, 2007 7:46 am

mandy, i don't understand your post, including that highlighted ego thing.. please don't send riddles, and make a straight to the point post like a normally do.

why should this be locked?

this thread was a split from the cartridge database posts, and posts made by audiophileman from the "Is this correct" thread which was locked because the issue has been addressed. in fact, none of you believe what i was trying to put across in that thread and even this SRA thing was brought in that has nothing to do with the original question, so i moved these SRA related discussions here.

we have an open discussion and audiophileman's contributions are enlightening.

4 is to 1. that's fine. in fact, all of you thought that all stylus are perpendicular to the record.

however, if you all think that this thread should be locked, then just post lock, and if it is posted 3 times from three members, i'll lock this thread.

fair enough?
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Postby zetroce » Tue May 22, 2007 8:11 am

I agree with Arnold, there's no reason for us to lock the thread. In fact, audiophileman has posted alot of information which i find interesting. Sayang naman kung titigil.

arnoldc wrote:4 is to 1. that's fine. in fact, all of you thought that all stylus are perpendicular to the record.



On this note, i disagree. It never occured to me that the stylus is always perpendicular to the record. I'm just not convinced with your opinion that the change in VTA angle not the same as the change in SRA angle. :?

We're all learning here. We just have to accept that we have differences in opinion. :)

Kaya, para sa akin, tuloy lang ang post.... :D
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Postby mandym » Tue May 22, 2007 8:23 am

arnoldc wrote:
4 is to 1. that's fine. in fact, all of you thought that all stylus are perpendicular to the record.

fair enough?


Sure thing Arnold, just please don't make it a fact that I think all stylus are perpendicular to the record. Never said so, never believed so!

Please lock this thread.
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Postby audiophileman2002 » Tue May 22, 2007 8:32 am

zetroce wrote:I agree with Arnold, there's no reason for us to lock the thread. In fact, audiophileman has posted alot of information which i find interesting. Sayang naman kung titigil.

arnoldc wrote:4 is to 1. that's fine. in fact, all of you thought that all stylus are perpendicular to the record.



On this note, i disagree. It never occured to me that the stylus is always perpendicular to the record. I'm just not convinced with your opinion that the change in VTA angle not the same as the change in SRA angle. :?

We're all learning here. We just have to accept that we have differences in opinion. :)

Kaya, para sa akin, tuloy lang ang post.... :D


Before I get misquoted here, I never stated the stylus is always perpendicular. If originally, the stylus has 0 SRA and originally the VTA is assuming 20 deg. the angle between these two lines is 70 deg. The 70 deg. will remain in all practical purposes be the same. When you increase the height at the pivot, say VTA is increased by 2 deg. the stylus will be at 92 deg. while the VTA is 22 deg. The difference again is 70 deg. Incidentally, this is an approximation from somewhere I read by Fremer (if I recall correctly) of Stereophile, every 4 mm increase in height will result in an increase of 1 deg. for the VTA. I don't recall he stated the length of arm. I would assume that this is a 9" arm. This is also the reason why in the VdH faq it is recommended to increase the height at the pivot by about 8 mm from horizontal position. This will give approximately give a 2 deg. rake. Hopefully my explanation is clearer.
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Postby arnoldc » Tue May 22, 2007 8:41 am

dong, audiophileman, i was making a comment from the other thread, not this thread.

audiophileman, thank you again for an informative post.

mandym wrote:Sure thing Arnold, just please don't make it a fact that I think all stylus are perpendicular to the record. Never said so, never believed so!


Acknowledged.

mandym wrote:Please lock this thread.


Noted. Two more to lock this thread.
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Postby BenC » Tue May 22, 2007 9:00 am

Hi audiophileman,

Thank for the clarification on the positive & negative SRA! :wink:

Cheersv,
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Postby audiophileman2002 » Tue May 22, 2007 9:22 am

Your welcome, Mr. Ben C.
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Postby audiophileman2002 » Tue May 22, 2007 9:41 am

I read somewhere here that Arnold uses a bubble gauge (level) to check if the arm is horizontal.
I myself do it in exactly the same manner. I think Arnold uses a tangential arm if I read it correctly using an ET. Correct me if I'm wrong. In my case, I use the radial arm. The only thing is before I put the bubble gauge I make sure I remove any tracking force and balance the counter weight so the arm is now slightly going up from the headshell. From years experience I know that point approx. so when I put my bubble gauge the tracking force is approx. 2.5 g. Once, the arm is down on the record, I adjust the height at the pivot to where the arm is horizontal. From there increase the height again.
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Postby arnoldc » Tue May 22, 2007 10:19 am

audiophileman, I use two linear trackers- Eminent Technology 2.0 (used to have 2.5 too) and clearaudio Tangent. Ditto with what you do, but for tangential. The ET is much easier than the Tangent.

I do have a JVC turntable with pivoted arm, I just set it at level like your method. The two carts on two wands that I have are using the same settings- arm parallel, 2g VTF (I do adjust the counterweight everytime I change arm wand), don't care about VTA/SRA. It sounds good to me, so there.
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Postby desmo » Tue May 22, 2007 10:32 am

Why lock? It's a good and informative thread.
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Postby conspicuous » Tue May 22, 2007 2:46 pm

audiophileman2002 wrote:
conspicuous wrote:
arnoldc wrote:conspicuous, the lateral frequency is the point where your cartridge get excited and vibrates from left to right. The vertical frequency is the point where you cartridge gets excited (literally) and it jumps up and down frantic fashion.


arnold, rod (audiophileman2002) - thank you for explaining this. thanks too for this discussion as i, and others i'm sure, am learning more about analog. so far it looks like trigonometry will suffice without having to go into differential equations yet :P :lol:

from the equations for lateral freq i can then deduce that the infamous "grado dance" is due to the relatively high compliance of the cantilever. or is it the other way around? if the cantilever is too stiff (low compliance) then it has a tendency to be excited to do the dance? (the grado dance describes the cartridge vibrating unwantedly from side to side at certain times) :?


I've done the resonance frequency calculation (tonearm/cartridge) for a good friend of mine for a Scoutmaster / JMW 9 / 501 II. Compliance of the 501 II is 9, weight of the cartridge is 8 g, the tonearm mass is 7.7 g. Theoretically, the resonance frequency is 13.19 Hz. I then phoned and spoke with HW and discussed this issue and he suggested for my friend to buy his 3 g headshell weight to lower the resonance. This weight costs $15 retail. I recalculated the resulting frequency is 12.1 Hz. This should be good enough.
It's you call if you want to purchase the VPI headshell weight of 3 g. Furthermore, it is also your call if you want to find out your actual resonance frequency. You have to purchase the HFNRR test record, $50 retail.


audiophileman, what happens if my resonance frequency is above the recommended 8 to 12 Hz? i have a similar system to your friend's (scout/jmw 9/shelter 501 II).

btw, the grado dance i observe is with my grado gold cart on a tp21 arm on my thorens td166II when i encounter a dirty record. :x cleaning the record helps reduce this phenomenon. :)
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Postby audiophileman2002 » Tue May 22, 2007 6:08 pm

conspicuous wrote: what happens if my resonance frequency is above the recommended 8 to 12 Hz? i have a similar system to your friend's (scout/jmw 9/shelter 501 II).

btw, the grado dance i observe is with my grado gold cart on a tp21 arm on my thorens td166II when i encounter a dirty record. :x cleaning the record helps reduce this phenomenon. :)


I have not heard his current set up as he lives in IN and haven't been there in a while. Initially, he was complaining about his bass being not very well defined. Here is what he said after he installed the headshell weight:
Quote
What a difference. The air and spacing were incredible. The bass
was really tightened up.
Unquote
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Postby conspicuous » Sat Jun 23, 2007 10:31 pm

audiophileman2002 wrote:
conspicuous wrote: what happens if my resonance frequency is above the recommended 8 to 12 Hz? i have a similar system to your friend's (scout/jmw 9/shelter 501 II).

btw, the grado dance i observe is with my grado gold cart on a tp21 arm on my thorens td166II when i encounter a dirty record. :x cleaning the record helps reduce this phenomenon. :)


I have not heard his current set up as he lives in IN and haven't been there in a while. Initially, he was complaining about his bass being not very well defined. Here is what he said after he installed the headshell weight:
Quote
What a difference. The air and spacing were incredible. The bass
was really tightened up.
Unquote


when i get a chance i will try a coin first (like the good old days :lol: ) to give weight to the headshell.

here's the shelter 501 mkII in action:
Image

here's a close up of the stylus:
Image

i would say that the stylus had a slightly positive SRA? or that the tonearm has its ass slightly up. i further assume that in the absence of any instruction from shelter that the proper alignment would be perpendicular to the record surface or a SRA of almost 0.

i wonder if for others like zyx bloom what alignment instructions there are. maybe just that the tonearm be parallel to the record surface so that the high SRA (stylus slanted forward) is normal because that's the way it was designed?
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Postby audiophileman2002 » Sat Jun 23, 2007 10:57 pm

That looks super! What headshell weight did you use? How many grams? The reason for the slight positive SRA is because of the angle of the stylus cutter. It is that way, as they want the debris from the cuttings out of the way and for the cutter not to run over them. Some people want to try to follow the way the master was cut, hence slightly positive and likewise not to run over the dirt in the LP. Perpendicular is fine, just not negative. From headshell level position, if you increase your pivot by 4 mm this will give you about an additional 1 degree of VTA / SRA in a 9" arm.
Again, this is one of those "different folks, different strokes".
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Postby conspicuous » Sun Jun 24, 2007 8:09 am

audiophileman2002 wrote:That looks super! What headshell weight did you use? How many grams? The reason for the slight positive SRA is because of the angle of the stylus cutter. It is that way, as they want the debris from the cuttings out of the way and for the cutter not to run over them. Some people want to try to follow the way the master was cut, hence slightly positive and likewise not to run over the dirt in the LP. Perpendicular is fine, just not negative. From headshell level position, if you increase your pivot by 4 mm this will give you about an additional 1 degree of VTA / SRA in a 9" arm.
Again, this is one of those "different folks, different strokes".


thanks :) i haven't had a chance to use any headshell weight yet hence i mentioned that i would try a coin first 8). as you calculated above i only need 3 grams.
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Postby arnoldc » Sun Jun 24, 2007 10:09 am

very nice cartridge pornography!
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Postby conspicuous » Sun Jun 24, 2007 6:48 pm

arnoldc wrote:very nice cartridge pornography!


i just happened to zoom in the picture and realized i captured the private and intimate moment of the diamond stylus in contact with the record groove :)
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