I would of course be correct, and of course no disrespect at all to Pete, and his products, that Pete's VTAF is in some ways a "Band-Aid" trying to cure-correct the deficiencies of certain, Less expensive Tonearms.
We have to be thankful that Pete did come along, and offer a modification to enable VTA on the fly for many less than state of the Art Tonearms which do in most cases nowadays incorporate adjustable VTA on the fly.
I wouldn't suspect the Brass to be a detriment to sound, but if there was some way I could avoid using any brass shims, I would personally prefer that option-solution, perhaps more from a cosmetic standpoint, more than anything. I'd personally rather have Cartridge squarely buttoned firmly to headshell, rather than having to cant Cartridge Body to achieve correct VTA-SRA.
An Arm that is "Ass High" IMO does look better than a Cartridge which is "Ass Low", and looks like it is almost scraping the LP when in play.
If the Platter-Platter Bearing could've in some way been shimmed in height, this would be one other way to correct additional Arm height, but also may incur other problems with Belt-Pulley height alignment as well?
A seperate Armboard could somehow perhaps be lowered, thus lowering Arm in the process?
One could perhaps slightly countersink the Bronze Bushing in Armboard?. One must remember, the face of Bushing must remain above Armboard surface in order to correctly work with the cooresponding Knurled Adjusting Nut. I think Pete touches on this in some wording I once read on his site, or another article of his? Mark
