Anti-Skate Weight …. Better sound without it?

Elliott,

You continue to insinuate that you and only you know what you are talking about and that you and only you are correctly setting up turntables here.  I have been setting up turntables since 1970 when as a college student I went to work in a high end hifi store in Seattle.  I set up TTs all the time.  I continue to learn, make no claims that I know it all.  It is a quest.  But your insistence in this thread that there is no such thing as a correctly set up turntable without need for AS is not accurate. 

E, no bearing is friction free, even brand new ones. My point is that his bearing has inherent friction having nothing to do with wear or dust or whatever. That inherent built in friction plus any added friction due to use or dirt adds to the AS force.

And I won’t rehash the fact I think your obsession with dust covers is over the top. But harmless I guess. I suspect your listening area may be more dusty than most, being so close to a large window in a room that appears to get a lot of human traffic. I cover the platters of my TTs that are not in use, and that’s all. I would never cover anything while playing a record. But each of my two systems has an entire space to itself, one with no windows.

Lewm,

I think we conversed on this subject in an earlier discussion.  Many years ago in conversation with an engineer from Thorens, I learned from him that that company discourages the use of the dust cover during playing of records.  Noted.  I never did anyway, but my customer learned to stop doing so and that solved a problem for him.  In my opinion our dust covers should be used for storage, removed or at least left open for play.  I do not think this is a great big deal, however, and if someone wants to play their records with the cover down, far be it from me to criticize. 

Thank you @elliottbnewcombjr for the very detailed write-up and shopping list.

I recently pulled my turntable (Thorens TD-320 MkI) from storage where it sat the last 30 years. Vinyl is no longer my primary source, but I enjoy playing the few hundred LPs I still own and my turntable might as well be set up correctly.

Bill, for me, when I did experiment with vs without a dust cover, on some TT that I no longer own and the name of which I can no longer remember, there were very obvious sonic negatives associated with use of the dust cover.  Plus, using the cover is an added bit of fuss for what is already a fussy process (playing a record).  Anyway, since that long ago experiment, I have been a no dust cover guy. I do now recognize that there may be ways to use a cover that do not cause resonance or reverberation to color the sound.  Mijostyn used to discuss this. To each his own, as you say.