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If you were to design a tone arm, what would it look like and feature?

There are a good number of different tonearm designs currently on the market. Some feature a uni-pivot, some gimbal bearings, some are air bearing designs, others use a knife edge...etc. We also have multi adjustability ( SRA, Azimuth weight, etc) and size--9 inch 10inch..twelve inch. Then we have the SAT tonearms that also feature carbon fibre etc., 
If money was no real object, what is your idea of the 'ideal tonearm' that you would design...and why?
128x128daveyf

Showing 2 responses by ct0517

ct0517's avatar
ct0517
2,041 posts
 
^^^^^
Larryi - very interesting design that Reed T-5 linear tracker. Always liked the Reed products never owned.

https://competition.adesignaward.com/design.php?ID=68105

From their website.
Tonearm’s turning part is based on low noise thrust-sleeve bearing. For angular rotation limited rotation sectional torque motor is designed and built.
OPERATION / FLOW / INTERACTION:
Tonearm’s position is controlled by laser and linear sensor grid. When tonearm is operating, laser beam should point into a center of linear sensor array. LED indicator shows tonearm status.

This part with the motor and laser sensor grid sounds complicated to me; and who knows how reliable its going to be. I prefer air bearing linear trackers which are by themselves passive devices, their levitation comes from an external air pump, the movement solely by the groove friction. External pumps are easily exchanged at will.

Also just a note.
The cart lateral strain reference you mention in your post is not a general one but based on comparison to specific linear trackers. I can tell you that the one I use, the ET 2.5, has been measured to have half the lateral strain of my pivot arm due to its unique counterweight design. This allows the owner to use the highest compliance MM if they choose.

Cheers

ct0517's avatar
ct0517
2,041 posts
 
jagjag - An auto arm lifter (gentle) at the end of a record that does not thump the arm

My turntable sits within armreach of the main listening chair. The stylus never makes it past the first runout groove and is lifted. But if at the other side of the room......

@daveyf
I’d like to see an "affordable" tonearm that is able to do VTA on the FLY while the record plays ( the only way to do it so you can hear it).......and not lose its settings (VTF)

I believe of all the tonearms mentioned on this thread so far only one has this capability, and it is not the expensive VTA with remote control one that Larry mentioned. 8^0

Atmasphere ^^^ that is SOTA in my book. VTA on the FLY and not lose settings. A designer needs to think that VTF is important enough to make a design that gets over physics.

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