Kudos to Williewonka for pointing out the precision setup which is required for that stylus. I had one on a rebodied Denon 103R here and it is indeed a bit*h to setup; it is by far the most demanding stylus out there to set up IMO and extremely small setup errors or deviations can result in very poor sound quality from it, unlike many other line contacts (Peter's standard line contact among them) and micro ridges. Everything is absolutely critical with that stylus: VTA/SRA, alignment, VTF and azimuth.
Effischer is also correct about VTF as directly noted above and one thing that is not often realized is that unipivots with underslung counterweights like the VPI arm will tend to over-read VTF unless it is read EXACTLY at record height, which is why VPI in the past often recommended VTF at the highest recommended manufacturer setting or even slightly above.
So Scooby, if you are using a typical digital stylus force gauge with a platform that might be even 2-3 mm above actual record height, which is not much, the read you would get with that gauge would potentially be .2 to .3 grams HIGHER than the actual VTF.
So if you were using a fairly standard Canrong type gauge on your VPI and setting VTF at 1.3 , your actual VTF was probably closer to 1.1 which could have resulted in mistracking, poor sound quality etc. If you're using that kind of gauge and are set at 1.8, you're real VTF is probably closer to 1.6.
The article from TNT Audio linked to below discusses the mis-read; it is generally inconsequential with many arms, but with the VPI (or as I said earlier any unipivot with an underslung counterweight) it is a very big deal that can cause a lot of people grief.
http://www.tnt-audio.com/sorgenti/in_balance_e.html
Effischer is also correct about VTF as directly noted above and one thing that is not often realized is that unipivots with underslung counterweights like the VPI arm will tend to over-read VTF unless it is read EXACTLY at record height, which is why VPI in the past often recommended VTF at the highest recommended manufacturer setting or even slightly above.
So Scooby, if you are using a typical digital stylus force gauge with a platform that might be even 2-3 mm above actual record height, which is not much, the read you would get with that gauge would potentially be .2 to .3 grams HIGHER than the actual VTF.
So if you were using a fairly standard Canrong type gauge on your VPI and setting VTF at 1.3 , your actual VTF was probably closer to 1.1 which could have resulted in mistracking, poor sound quality etc. If you're using that kind of gauge and are set at 1.8, you're real VTF is probably closer to 1.6.
The article from TNT Audio linked to below discusses the mis-read; it is generally inconsequential with many arms, but with the VPI (or as I said earlier any unipivot with an underslung counterweight) it is a very big deal that can cause a lot of people grief.
http://www.tnt-audio.com/sorgenti/in_balance_e.html
