2. analog
  3. 1254864364

Anti skate and tonearm damping query

I have read a number of threads relating to both antiskating and tonearm damping on the JMW 9" Sig.arm and find myself a bit confused.......I have been experimenting a little and have reached the conclusion that I must be deaf. I have not used the additional antiskating system, I have tried twisting and not twisting the leno wire and can hear no difference. If the Leno wire is not twisted therefore no antiskate, will this damage the stylus or the album??
I have also filled the damping well above the taper to the base of the point and still cannot hear 'the music being sucked out' or indeed, an improvement. Do I fill the well up to the point!! and then work backwards. Those that finetune using the damping seem to have some sort of epiphany when the 'sweet' spot is reached.

Can someone please shed light on how I should be going about setting the AS and finetuning the damping on the arm. The table is a scoutmaster with super platter and sds, the cartridge is the dynavector Te Kaitora Rua

Thanks
wes4390
quiddity
119 posts
 
Doug

I find your argument a little confusing. If one did as you say and merely twisted the cartridge in the arm while keeping the alignement of the arm WRT the groove tangent the same, you would create very little force, as my post above explains.

The force you do create would be because the cantilever was bent out of alignment and the suspension is trying to force it back. This force is very small compared top the true skating force and with good alignment it is even smaller.

Mark Kelly
quiddity
119 posts
 
Oops

The Xs and Ys are reversed. Consider the arm lying along the X axis with the Y axis pointing down and it comes out right.

Sorry about that

Mark Kelly
hdm
1,057 posts
 
Mark: I'm interested specifically in what your thoughts are on antiskating as it relates to stylus profile.

If I'm reading you correctly, elliptical styli should require less antiskate than spherical and line contact should require more than elliptical-please correct me if I'm wrong and misunderstanding your post.

Despite all the reading on (in theory) how little antiskate may actually be needed, I've found that my Denon 103R (with its stock spherical stylus) sounds best with an antiskate setting that is very close to the 2.6 gram tracking force.

I'm in the process of having another 103R retipped with a line contact stylus and am curious as to what, if any, changes I may have to make with antiskate when that cartridge comes back. Would you expect that, like the stock 103R, one retipped with a line contact would require antiskate set to approximate tracking weight? Thanks in advance.
quiddity
119 posts
 
HDM

The reason tonearm manufacturers put a scale on the antiskate corresponding to VTF is that the skate force is directly proportional to VTF, not that it equals VTF.

The constant of proportionality has already been factored in and the manufacturer based this on "average" vinyl composition and a typical contact area.

The difference between your old stylus and your new stylus will depend on the degree of polish on the diamond and the actual area of the contact patch. Note that with line contact styli the actual area changes with VTA so VTA and antiskate interact. BTW This is the only rational explanation of the effects of VTA I know of.

This also shows that even if one confines onesself to the realms of actual verifiable physics the situation "on the vinyl" is quite complex. There is nothing in audio which can't be explained with physics, its just that we haven't worked out all the physics yet. One thing is certain, if an explanation for an effect defies the known laws of physics than that explanation is wrong.

Mark Kelly
perrew
299 posts
 
Mark, could you walk me through a real life example of Anti_Skate setup with your own arm and cart?
More to discover