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Troubleshoot tracking issue

I have an SME V arm on a Michell Orbe SE. I've been trying this new cartridge for a little bit. Previously, I've been using a Shelter 901 which weighs in at 9.1g. The new cartridge weighs in at 10.0g, and the diamond is slightly more forward.

When I installed this new cartridge, I rebalanced the arm to account for the weight difference, and also readjusted pretty much everything else to make sure that it is set up correctly.

Several friends have been trying the same cart and they all told me that this cartridge is a tracking champ. But I've been having some tracking issue. Most noticeably at the outer rim. When I first put the cart down, it would just skip the first minute worth of the first track, but then it would play through the rest of the LP side just fine. The recommended tracking force is 1.5-2.0g. I'm trakcing at 2.5g with slightly higher antiskate and it is still doing that. I checked the lift beneath, and it is clear of the arm tube when the cartridge meets the vinyl.

The arm is about 8 years old. Is the anti-skate spring loosing tension? the damping fluid needs to be replaced? Something else I'm doing wrong to cause this problem????

FrankC
gundam91

Showing 1 response by zenblaster

zenblaster
504 posts
 
Any problems with the previous cart?
First make sure everything is level.
Did you set the anti skate visually or did you just set it to correspond to the tracking weight. It sounds like there is too much pull towards the center so you could try backing off the anti skate. This might allow you to back the tracking force down a bit also. Get a shitty record and play around with the TF

Its nice to have a blank record/side to set anti skate visually (so the cant is dead plumb as opposed to a slight angle forward or back)
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