2. analog
  3. 130880-2238

Question about how to use Feickert Protractor

Greetings from Oregon,

I'd been following the discussion about the Feickert Protractor and finally decided to order one.  I'd been using the GeoDisc for setup, and I wanted something a little more precise.  I have been working with the protractor this evening, and the directions on the second step are not entirely clear.  The first step is easy enough - set up the protractor with the gauge pin over the pivot point (easy to find on a unipivot) and adjust the cartridge to the bulls eye in the geometry you want (I'm using Baerwald).  Moving to step two things become unclear

My first question:
Step 2 says "..we don't need to aim over the pivot point anymore. Please rotate the Protractor so that the stylus tip touches the cross hairs at step 2."  The picture shows the stylus sitting right on the target.  Correct me if I'm wrong, but that's not physically possible.  The cross hairs at step 2 are a fixed distance away from the cross hairs at step 1.  There's no way to rotate the protractor to make this happen.  You have to move the tonearm over to step 2, right?

My second question:
Assuming that I'm moving the tonearm over to the lines for step 2 on the protractor, should the stylus fall right on the bullseye as it did at step 1?  Mine doesn't, but I assume there's nothing I can do about it without having the whole tonearm assembly remounted.  It's a VPI Prime, which doesn't appear to have any adjustments for pivot-to-spindle distance.  

I hope the questions make sense, as it's not easy to explain without having the protractor in front of you.  Hopefully, someone with experience using the Fleickert can help.  

Thanks for any advice!
Scott
  
smrex13

Showing 1 response by captain_winters

captain_winters
133 posts
 
I used to have a VPI Classic 3 and JWM 10.5i which has a 258mm spindle to pivot length and an effective length of 273mm.
If you take your arm board off, like I did, there is a couple of mm of play in the assembly, because of the hole sizes etc. So Everytime I put it back together I tightened loosley then manuevered the assembly to 258mm pivot to spindle distance before tightening. Also make sure you are measuring the horizontal distance, so both the pivot and the spindle are on the same plane. Think of a right triangle, you don't want to measure the hypotenuse, otherwise that will result in a 1mm or so error on your part. 
What I presumed, when they put these tables together they are not always exact because of couple of mm play in the arm board coupling. 
Easy enough to remedy, just loosen, move to 258mm on the same plane, then tighten. 
More to discover