In the October issue of Stereiphile, there was an article on a tonearm that had no offset angle and therefore had no skating force. The disadvantage of this is at the beginning and end of the record, the tracking angle error was much greater than what you get with an offset angle. For conventional tonearms that have an offset, and require anti-skating, which can never be perfect, the typical tracking error has a supremum of about 2 degrees, and according to online Lofgren calculators, this imposes a second-order harmonic distortion less than 2%.
I have a single-ended triode amplifier consisting of vintage globe 45 triodes transformer coupled to 833A SETs which drives Magnepans. Such SETs typically have second-order harmonic distortion as high as 10% which does not hurt the sound. A straight tonearm without an offset would have a maximum, or supremum tracking error of just under 10 degrees. If this causes a second-order harmonic distortion of less than 10%, would not this be irrelevant in a SET system? Is there any way of calculating this, or has this ever been studied?
@reimarc My own experiencing of changing to a new Tonearm has similarities to your own.
I was first introduced to the TA at a forum event, where during a range of different equipment being demo'd, much of what was individuals designs for an Idler Drive, I heard a demo' that caught my attention.
At a later date, I was invited to the individuals home that had demo'd the set up that was certainly very well thought off and for me indelible as an experience.
I was introduced to the design that was selected to be used and the importance of particular materials being used as exchange materials, and the very tight tolerances able to be machined for the interfaces.
Further comparison demo's were done between TA's, with the result being I bought into this design for a TA, and have not felt to date a change is needed, even when being involved with a few changes that have been produced for the TA since my becoming an owner.
I am the happy owner of the 7" Rigid Float CB (carbon fiber) arm. I met Akimoto-san in March near his home in Kamakura. He is a wonderful human being; communication worked well and he explained to me the important parts of his design, most importantly - as had already been pointed out earlier - the complete decoupling from vibrations by means of the floating suspension: the arm floats in a viscous oil and is kept in place by a strong internal magnet pulling it down towards the rigid/stationary part of the housing w/o touching it. Imagine a ball in a bowl floating on a film of liquid: gravity will always pull it towards the center; now replace gravity with magnetic attraction, and you get the gist of the mechanism. It's comparable to a uni-pivot arm without the mechanical drawbacks (I myself have used the Woody arm for a long time: I loved its vivid sound, but hated the hour-long set-up routine). The second, and in my opinion unique feature is the complete freedom of placement: the arm comes as a self-contained (and quite heavy) unit that can be placed at any point around the platter, even away from the plinth, as long as the stylus can be positioned into a tiny hole in the placement template (a thin rectangular piece of plastic foil) above the platter. The entire set up, including VTF after cartridge mounting on the supplied head shell, takes no longer than 10 to 15 minutes. Akimoto-san holds a degree of mechanical engineering from the University of Tokyo, Japan's top university, and he is also a passionate audiophile. Combine the two, and you get this iconoclastic masterpiece, which sounds like it wasn't there at all. Needless to say, I bought the arm while we were still enjoying sashimi at a tiny place near the railway station - and never looked back. It's a true game-changer!
@lewm then let's say it is daring to go off the beaten path. It is the Reed 5T Lou. I would love to try both arms also, but they will not fit on my turntable and i have not current plans to buy another. @larryistaying digital is the smart thing. What does that say about the rest of us. J Carr tried to convince me that the cantilever of my Atlas SL was deviating because I did not know how to set my antiskating correctly. When I told him I set it to 11% by WallySkater he said I should have set it to 14%. The cantilever has stabilized a few degrees towards the right channel, away from the spindle. It is still one of the finest sounding cartridges I have ever heard, but I shall not buy another. I paid $450 for what should have been a warranty repair and will move on.
Dear @viridian : What the reviewer posted in your last link on the VIV about the kind of bearing is way important. I just today read the link information.
Way before that I posted in the VIV Labs thread something that almost no owner made a comments in my post and what I posted was the excellent damping bearing oil " mechanism " and the arm tube O rings.
All those for me ( I posted a thread about just tonearm damping due to its critical importance. ) could represent over the 70% maybe more of the sound that owners experienced and still experience more than the underhung issue. Damping can easily gives that better dynamic, clarity, definition, better bass performance, etc. etc. even in overhang tonearms designs and always I posted for at least the last 20 years the tonearm critical damping.
I'm not dimishing the underhung idea but my first hand experiences about AS ( even what mijo and other think. ) and due that through the Wally tractor the AS range is ( I can't remember exactly. ) between 9% to 12 " that seems to me not really substantial I can confirm that if we use a good tonearm design ( good damped too. ) if we use it with out apply any AS the " response " from that fact is not only cleary, dynamic and the like but the MUSIC flows as in a live event. I don't use AS and over all the grooved LP surface the imaging is DEAD centered always.
That's really why I don't but the VIV. Again that kind of those to ways of damping are really the VIV: oil floating bearing and O rings.
That's my take and I appreciated that you linked to know that not only me took seriously the tonearm damping in the VIV but that reviewer. Seems to me that almost all owners give everything to the underhung design, well not me even that I'm not an owner.
Yes as JC said: the S and intrinsecal " play " with the AS is the problem down there, so why not NO AS in overhang tonearm. This is me, only thinking " loud ".
It really doesn't matter what the naysayers are saying nay to. There forte is remaining where they are and professing what they have.
The better types, to take a lead from, are those who moved on to the Viv from the tools naysayers are advocates of, or those who get their most satisfying experience using Underhung Tools and Over hung Tools in conjunction, where the differences are seen to be the bonus.
Each to their own on such matters, unless one likes to get the zGloves On.
It’s common in high end audio to try for oneself to find gear subjectively pleasing. Very few are so risk adverse that they insist on understanding why it works before purchasing, often insisting on proof aka pointing outwards when the fear of being wrong (losing money?) is inwards. No, it’s not courage.
In Stereophile Oct2024, even turntable set-up guru Michael Trei heard the positive attributes of a ViV tonearm.
Opinions and reviews are commonly active upon: try this dish, this movie’s great, watch out for the dog, etc, although higher risk usually leads to higher scrutiny.
I value sonic excellence and variety, so I plan to purchase a ViV tonearm. I’ve looked deeply at LT and am uncomfortable with the complexity, fragility, and fiddlyness. But I’ll probably get a LT to hear vinyl unstressed beginning to end which matters for orchestra crescendos.
On a side note, from the lengthy ViV Float thread, wouldn’t it be great if the stubborn naysayers would try a ViV tonearm for themselves. They’d be pleasantly surprised at the high sonic value. Also, hoping that they would use their substantial intellect to experiment to find answers - lots of fun taking on this challenge, answers that they would share to scratch our curiosity itch. Win Win Win
Wow! That talk by J. Carr covers a lot of topics in a very informative manner. The explanations are terrific and balanced, with pluses and minuses of various design choices explained very well. This is one of the few long discussions worth the viewing effort.
I have zero experience with underhung arms but, have followed this and companion threads with interest.
Same here, @richardkrebs. It's a puzzle that these arms would seemingly defy so many of the principles we've come to accept, and yet produce amazing sonics. I hope to hear one some day and until then, won't dismiss them outright as others here have been willing.
I have zero experience with underhung arms but, have followed this and companion threads with interest. Some of you may have seen the talk given by Jonathan Carr to a group or audiophiles in which, amongst other topics, he talks about underhung arms., . for those who haven't, here is the link
Hopefully we can agree that Jonathan knows a thing or two about cartridges, so his opinion on underhung arms should carry more weight that most. See the relevant part starting at 18:40
Mijostyn brings up the LT and the 5G pretty much EVERY time the Viv is mentioned. I have no argument; those may be superior to the Viv, but that’s not the point. As to the skating force generated by the Viv: it’s always going to be proportional to TAE. So at the outer grooves it may be 10 degrees, worst case, gradually decreasing to zero skating at the single null point where also the direction of the skating force changes by 180 degrees and again reaches a negative maxima at the innermost grooves. A graph of the magnitude of the skating force is a near straight line passing through zero. Thus I would argue the Viv is much gentler than a classic overhung tonearm in terms of aberrant stylus wear. And it’s not a “brave” act to own and use the Viv, at all.
The Viv arm causes a deviation from tangency of up to 10 degrees at the start of a record and this declines to zero before again increasing to 2 degrees. This means FAR less skating than the skating force of an arm with an offset angle of 22 degrees or so. The lower level of skating might argue in favor of no skating compensation.
The Reed T 5 approach to tangency, with no offset angle to the headshell is a great approach, at least theoretically. The same goes for the Schroeder LT arm. Parallel tracking arms using a conventional pivot and a servo mechanism to move the pivot to maintain tangency are also theoretically good. Air bearing arms, and other low friction approaches that drag the arm back into tangency imposes forces on the stylus/cantilever that is sort of akin to skating forces.
I would like to try the Reed arm, but, it is quite expensive and I mostly listen to digital anyway.
@jasonbourne71Even if those arms "sound fine", lack of an antiskating device is going to increase record wear and cause miss tracking in the right channel prematurely.
The Viv arm does not get rid of skating. The only point it does not skate is when it is perfectly tangent to the groove. Straight line trackers and arms like the Reed 5T and the Schroder Lt do not skate at all if they are set up correctly which is no easy feat. Level has to be perfect.
Lou is a brave sort for trying the Viv arm, it's how you learn. Hey Lou, I finally discovered how best to run the Soundlabs if you care to talk about it. It only cost me $40,000 in mistakes, chump change. I may be able to recover some of it.
Jason, you say you wouldn’t use the Viv because it violates well established design principles, and that’s fine. But you go on to say you own two pivoted overhung tonearms with headshell offset, which in and of itself dramatically enhances skating force, each of which lacks AS, and you use them happily. Leaving aside the fact brought up by viridian that you are likely wrong in assuming one of those arms lacks AS, can you see the inconsistency in your decision making?
Skating force exists for all pivoted arms. How consequential it is can be debated. I have two early Fidelity Research arms ( FR 29, FR 54) with no anti-skate. Evidently the builder Ikeda-san didn't think it necessary. Joe Grado's walnut tonearm also was sans anti-skate. I have one of them too! All these arms sound fine! I would be reluctant to use the Viv Float arm because it violates well-established design principles.
IMHO, neither proposition is true. The distortions of different devices in the signal path are not necessarily additive, nor are they necessarily complementary. And if we’re talking about the Viv Float, it’s my impression as an owner that it introduces less audible distortion than my many conventional overhung tonearms.
To truly understand Pindac, one must grasp the fine art of capitalizing random words in a sentence. Only then will you have true enlightenment, grasshopper.
Audiogon is the site I visited for many years prior to Joining, where much of what I witnessed was the bemusement of plenty who were contributing.
I joined with an intention to help simplify things, my suggestions are reachable, achievable and aimed at the observer from the side lines or future visitors who may discover a thread I am contributing to.
I have witnessed bemusement offered up on this forum that does come with a cost for a reader. My causing bemusement comes with Zero Cost to a reader, but does seemingly stir further thought for some, which is constructive, is my amusement for myself, there's nothing like seeing the penny drop occasionally.
As when Joe Biden was on a Official State Tour on an Island in Europe, where he had invited an encountered on a Bridge miming Fisherman to a Pub. After having bought the Fisherman's third Pint of Guinness, following the Bridge encounter. Joe inquired " How many did you Catch from the River" to receive the Fisherman's reply " You're the First today"
Pindac, wow, I have no idea of you’re trying to say here. I had a wonderful writing professor in college which would point out that your "fog index" is through the roof lol. You’d be well served reading the Elements of Style (Strunk and White) and rewrite this so that it was clear what you’re trying to say. I’m interested to hear it, really!
I'm guessing you’re trying to say have an open mind and be willing to accept new ideas. Eleven words, one short sentence, vs...eh, I got tired counting lol.
"There is a principle which is a bar against all information, which is proof against all arguments and which can not fail to keep a man in everlasting ignorance-that principle is contempt prior to investigation."
Where investigation and experiences off are not easily attained, an open mind is also a wonderful companion and failsafe against everlasting ignorance .
Thanks for referencing those threads, Dogberry. I read the Audiokharma thread today. Boy, some of those guys go off less than half cocked. It would be exhausting to try to correct all the misstatements.
It's a fascinating subject, not least for the love for underhung arms exhibited by owners contrasting with the hatred exhibited by those who do not own them.
Stax and Micro Seiki both produced Straight Arms, but not Zero Offset .
When looking at the Models it does seem a Zero Offset can be created, a little thought for a Headshells Cart' Mounting Mounting would be the ideal place to modify.
Both Stax and Micro Seiki has a removable Headshell of the Flag on a Flagpole Type.
There are simplistic alternative methods to attach a removable Headshell to the Wand that are a substantial improvement. The Zero Offset seems to make this as a option even easier to achieve.
As made known in other Threads, I am at some point in the future to be demonstrated a friends TA Design as a Underhung Geometry, with them producing a alternate Headshell for their TA.
There are Headshell designs in the following link that will attach to the Wand, these designs enable a rigidity not usually achievable from a Bayonet attachment, the ones in the link are much closer to a formed Headshell on the Wand
@mijostyn would make easy work of producing one of these alternate removable Headshells if the OD of the Wand is supplied. There will also be a need for getting over any confliction held with Underhung Geometry
Even with a straight arm with no offset angle, the tracking angle error could have been lessened by making the arm longer and not underhung. The reason for this design is not only to minimize skating force, it is designed to be extremely rigid by being short.
I have to say I was surprised, but it does sound good.
Yamaha also have a Vintage Design, as well as Stax and Micro Seiki also experimented with similar designs, but not zero offset that are now Vintage Models.
Yamaha also have a modern design for the Tonearm used with the GT 5000 Table, this arm is wired with PC Triple C. I am an advocate of this wire type, and also with experiences of having been demo’d a Tonearm with this wire type, used as a continuous wire from Cart’ Pins to Phono’ Input. Using such a Wire, as a Wands Signal Path is a very wise choice.
Truglider is another Brand producing Zero Offset designs.
There’s a thread on the Viv Float tonearm. I suggest you review it. You are neglecting to mention that such tonearms are mounted so the stylus underhangs the spindle, as is the case for all of the commercially available tonearms that have zero headshell offset. Finally, such tonearms DO generate a skating force except where the cantilever is tangent to the groove; it’s just much less than for conventional pivoted overhung tonearms. I think it’s specious to analogize the HD of your SET with the tracking angle error of an underhung tonearm in the first place. I own a Viv Float, and I like it very much.
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