Math calculations about the speed of a TT..help...

Very informative responses. Thanks for sharing your knowledge folks. Taught me something new today. Sean
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Nice post, Ghostrider. Didn't you sit behind me in physics? :-)

Weisera - You're confusing angular velocity with linear velocity. The angular velocity of the LP is 33 and a third revolutions per minute (RPM). This value applies to all points of the record (except the point at the geometric center.)

The linear velocity, however, does vary with radial distance from the center of the record. The linear velocity of a point on the record is equal to the product of the point's distance from the center (effective radius) and the angular velocity of the record.

Thus the linear velocity of a point 3 inches from the center of a record with an angular velocity of 33 and a third RPM would be 100 inches per minute.

So what does this mean? All things being equal, the higher the linear velocity at the stylus, the better the sound. Thus an LP sounds its best toward the outside of the record, and its worst at toward the inner grooves.

That's why some audiophile records are cut with large runout zones. They avoid using the inner third or so of the record to keep the sound quality up. Another strategy is to cut the record at 45 RPM, which increases the linear velocity at all points of the record by about 135% ((45/33.33)x100%), but cuts overall playing time by about 20%.

In real life a cutting engineer has to balance fidelity across the record, required playing time on the side, bass response, and dynamic range. The latter two items affect groove width, and thus impact playing time.

Great answer Twl. Right to the point.

KF

It is because the master is cut the same way it is played.