Alignment tool for SME V + Shelter

Hi Nsgarch
ok, ok, ok, so VTA is totally, utterly, completely, unrelated to SRA you say. So you'd be then saying that the stylus is also unrelated to the cantilever?!
And maybe then the stylus' contact-line is unrelated to the stylus?
Oh, oh, please gimme THAT link so I may also partake in this 'current fantasy'.

And in any case *SRA* is wrong also, since it should be then called *SCLRA* Stylus-Contact-Line-Rake-Angle, since the 'stylus' is only doing that picking-up via its 'contact-line' touching the groove, yes?
And as it so happens, the angle of the contact-line maybe just as unrelated to that 'clump' of stylus also!

As to the spring-steel finger lift --- you do recall that we are amplifying that pissy cart signal by 1000s of times and THAT - will make you hear a fly fart when sitting on your head shell, promise :-)
Greetings,

Nandric & All,
right, --- am I listening to music? Sir, YES Sir!

Let's just say that (most?) SME V users fall a bit outside the anal-retentive mould of "sub-micron aligners/adjusters" and as long as they know where they fit into this "aligner/adjuster window", most unnecessary arguments can be avoided.
Even in Audio, it's a free world after all --- just don't come asking for advice on inner / outer or what ever groove distortion if you are a SME V owner, and there shall be piece.

I like mine, and have NO intention to change round holes for slots. When I had distortion it turned out to be the cart rather then the arm this far. (I measured some of those bastard carts, made my point and send them back to the factory for replacement).
Let's hold thumbs it'll stay this way in future -- SME V arm + bad cart = groove distortion, KISS :-)
Greetings,

Nsgarch
y.s.:
>> ...the ones who refuse to use the arm with the finger lift attached, and who remove the bridge across the main bearing. <<<

No finger-lift, OK fine, I just put some heat-shrink over it so call me anal too. But removing the bridge is BS^2, call it crap, sorry. I have listened to it, it makes the sound in-coherent, period. (That arm was designed with the bridge and so was the sound or 'non-sound' it makes.)

As to that VTA tool, -- the longer I been fiddling with VTA, all the more I keep it with Roy Gandy's (REGA) take. It's important to find a good working level (and take some time to do it) but then get a rest and listen to music and don't keep on chasing 'sound'. Every cart has some sort of 'sweet-spot' but is not normally THAT small so we have to get anal about micro-degrees --- really it is not, and neither is all the rest from LP to LP. If it was, I'd been long, long back with this harmonically leached out CD music.
Greetings,
PS: taking care and practicing good set-up is one thing, getting 'retentive' quite another in my experience.
Enjoy a good weekend,

Howdy Nsgarch,
well now didn't I read that 'VTA' post, don't know, maybe I did? - didn't I read enough VTA stuff already? Uff...:-)
SRA, VTA, what ever, I do know the difference picture's right there in my head (as I said, didn't I read enough yet?).
I still use(d) the more widely 'used' terminology, it's less confusing with most folks - I think. (Like every UK dude weights in STONE --- then come the Kilogram, etc.)
I do not suggest to start yet another white-paper on the subject. If the stylus' contact ridge angle be always 90 deg to the cantilever it actually would be a perfectly interchangeable figure. Alas, this is not the case, so VTA ~ SRA are somewhat a bit more loosely related ~ by a couple of degrees at best.
As I said, take time out to optimize it for each cart/arm and then - peace be with you brother.

As to the finger lift 'story' we seem to agree on NOT mutilating, stripping down the V arm. It is not the torque (measured in uN/um of 'angel-wings' in this case?) but rather the resonance of this thing sticking out on the side. It's too practical for me to leave it off, putting heat shrink will take care of the resonance (at least in the audio band) so I guess nobody can say that I didn't try :-)
Greetings,

Hi Nsgarch,
maybe we have to set out our trades/professions for some helpful insights?
I'm a trained mechanical engineer and actually have even WORKED with chisels on METAL.
Next, I do furniture- and speaker-building, so again I use wood chisels (even Japanese double laminate ones --- and I sharpen them too, ho, ho). 25 deg. main angle and 30 deg. honed angle mostly, and depending on the cutter AND the tool.
Variations of 10 - 15 deg. depending on the application are not uncommon.

Yes, I did read that thread, not that it changes what I understand, but what I actually disagree with is the statement that the cutter-head is/was at ~ 1.5 deg (obviously tilted forward of the 90 deg. makes 88.5 deg. or 91.5 deg. so take your pick). In fact some 2-7 deg. seems closer to what has been the case when cutting lacquers or DMM masters.

This does in no way explain your take, that SRA is supposed to be NOT related to VTA...
VTA, is the angle between the flat record surface and the line the cantilever makes --- and the cantilever is bonded to the stylus at some angle greater than 90 deg. -- but it is then FIXED! So, how can the two then NOT be related, hallo?!

You are an architect you would understand what I try to get at, and I'm not talking just some numbers not being related here.
Depending on the angle between the stylus' contact-line to cantilever you can get either SRA or VTA, AND in fact those cart manufactures 'stupidly', 'stupidly', quote VTA (if they do it at all) and all then wait for us 'clever' audio-dudes to re-express it in SRA angle terms, wow.
If a cart manufacturer quotes 22 or say 25 deg. VTA you actually know squat about SRA -- because you do not know the angle that was used between the cantilever and the line-contact, or do you?
Do you know what angle the lacquer was cut at for the LP? No way, so you go fiddle your SRA or VTA angle until it sounds the best to your ears - and the rest of it is just a case of intellectualizing what we truly don't know, in terms of the actual degrees.
So you see, that's why I got a-plenty of VTA and SRA by now. Eish!
Axel

Nsgarch
I think we actually do not have a disagreement on the essentials. BUT if you have carts that like arm down (to keep it KISS) so the V's arm is just avoiding touching the record, I.E. down from level by 3-4mm. Yet another that likes it UP from level by a similar amount for the same record --- it is this what I'm talking about. What has changed is the angle between stylus' line-contact and cart mounting surface (at the optimal VTF) via the cantilever where it is mounted on.

Insisting on SRA is fine: IF I CAN ACTUALLY SEE IT!
Using that tool which produced the pic in the other thread OH YEAH, hurray!
So if I can't REALLY ascertain that 1.7 deg or what ever angle from vertical LP surface to the stylus' line contact -- then what is the good in riding on SRA? I have not the smallest issue with the theory, but in the end I need something more practical/useful I can work with, or?

Who wants to disagree with e.g. atomic weights, but I still get my sausage in pounds or ounces (in US I'd guess).
"Horses for courses" I make MORE mistakes setting SRA not really seeing what's going on, then simply listening --- so far at least my experience.
As nice as it might be to set the stylus contact-line to 1.7 deg. after I established that's what is needed for the record in the first place...
There are many such things in life, but for the practical current status a bit utopia I say.
You see already the MAJOR discrepancy in cutter angle statements! Roy Gandy has it at 0 - 7 deg. , your source knows or uses 1.7 deg. on you go.

In fact I think all of it has been used. So now you use this ASSUMPTION of how the record was cut to get completely immersed in setting SRA to the 1/10 of a degree. I'm sure it sound fine too, but because if it was 1 degree out it still sounded as fine.
Greetings,