Tom,
After seeing and hearing the YouTube video, I think the result is brilliant. Even on computer speakers, the sound is smooth and distortionless, with no hint of that irritating tracking distortion especially at the end grooves.
Please do not take my comments from the other thread too seriously, as they (and the entire thread) are entirely for entertainment only, a kind of picking the brain game. Your work is admirable and it can reshape people's idea of tonearm design.
Keep up the good work!
After seeing and hearing the YouTube video, I think the result is brilliant. Even on computer speakers, the sound is smooth and distortionless, with no hint of that irritating tracking distortion especially at the end grooves.
Please do not take my comments from the other thread too seriously, as they (and the entire thread) are entirely for entertainment only, a kind of picking the brain game. Your work is admirable and it can reshape people's idea of tonearm design.
Keep up the good work!
Litz wire that is made of 30 strands of 0,04 mm each (together 0,30 mm), has a drawback. It has a high electrical capacity because all the strands together have a very large surface area. That doesn’t matter for MC cartridges, but for most MM cartridge it is a problem. Nevertheless, the electrical resistance is nice: nearby 0,5 ohm/m. The flexibility of the wire is better than “normal” copper wire of the same properties. That’s because Litz wire is only slightly twisted and is entwined with very thin silk fibre.
Litz wire that’s made of 10 strands of 0,05 mm each (together 0,26 mm) has a far lower capacity but the electrical resistance is twice as much as the 30 strands Litz wire. Nevertheless, removing the entwined silk fibre will make it far more flexible and... when I use 2 wires for every connection, the electrical resistance and capacity will be nearly equal to quality tonearm wiring. And that’s very attractive for the owners of MM cartridges.
In the armtube the Litz wire can keep the entwined silk fibre. Only the distance between the end of the armtube and the RCA-connectors have to be untwined. So the question is: how to untwine the silk fibre from the 0,26 mm Litz wire? The image below shows a solution.
The roller or bearing is rotated by hand/finger and the other hand pulls carefully the silk fibre to the right. You can use a very slowly rotating drilling machine but when the silk fibre is tangled, you have to throw the rumpled piece of Litz wire away and start again with a new one. When you never bend the copper strands – even by soldering, etc. – it will be like a thin flexible thread. But one wrong movement and that’s gone. I dropped by accident a piece of tape upon the copper strands... (see the image below).
Nevertheless, when you have everything soldered and have attached again the tonearm in the bowl with water, the resistance against deforming of the tonearm wiring (8 wires) is far less than the 4 pieces of 30 strands Litz wires before. In fact, it is nearly perfect (the electrical resistance is 0,5 ohm by 90 cm tonearm wiring).
Unfortunately, there is a drawback too... When I trust my ears, there is slightly more noise from the amplifier and the cause must be the 8 wires within the 3 mm inner carbon tube of the armtube. Apparently, there is too few space/isolated air between the wires so there will be some mutual electromagnetic influence. What to do about it?
When I replace the 8 silk winded pieces of Litz wire inside the armtube with 4 solid copper wires (0,25 mm) with a better isolation – like 30 AWG wire wrapping wire – and solder the untwined Litz wires 2 by 2 at each wire wrapping wire just outside the end of the armtube, I have got two enhancements: less “hum” and a further decrease of the capacity of the tonearm wiring (profit for MM cartridges). I even can separate these 4 wires within the 3 mm armtube (inside diameter) by some very small square pieces of wood (like a part of a match). So that’s exactly what I have done (see image below; the Litz wire isn’t yet soldered at the wire wrap wires).
Now there is only one thing left. How will someone correctly separate the adjustment of:
We don’t need the correct angle of the horizontal bar when we adjust the right position of the RCA-connectors. To control the adjusted position of the RCA-connectors – the balance of the resistance of the tonearm wiring – is theoretical very easy. When we put the stylus at the middle of the average modulated groove – 103,2 mm from the centre of the spindle – and the roller bar is free from the horizontal bar, the armtube must drift to a position at right angles to the spindle. Fortunately, this not only theoretical, because the first time I tried this “trick”, the tonearm stopped moving exactly at right angles to the spindle.
Thereafter we can adjust the right angle of the horizontal bar with the help of a record (controlling from time to time the position of the tonearm). A transparent right-angled triangle is a perfect tool to control the correct position of the armtube/tonearm. The best position is in the middle of the minimum and maximum angle in relation to a correct movement of the sphere along the trajectory. This link will give you a scalable and printable PDF of the image above.
Litz wire that’s made of 10 strands of 0,05 mm each (together 0,26 mm) has a far lower capacity but the electrical resistance is twice as much as the 30 strands Litz wire. Nevertheless, removing the entwined silk fibre will make it far more flexible and... when I use 2 wires for every connection, the electrical resistance and capacity will be nearly equal to quality tonearm wiring. And that’s very attractive for the owners of MM cartridges.
In the armtube the Litz wire can keep the entwined silk fibre. Only the distance between the end of the armtube and the RCA-connectors have to be untwined. So the question is: how to untwine the silk fibre from the 0,26 mm Litz wire? The image below shows a solution.
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
The roller or bearing is rotated by hand/finger and the other hand pulls carefully the silk fibre to the right. You can use a very slowly rotating drilling machine but when the silk fibre is tangled, you have to throw the rumpled piece of Litz wire away and start again with a new one. When you never bend the copper strands – even by soldering, etc. – it will be like a thin flexible thread. But one wrong movement and that’s gone. I dropped by accident a piece of tape upon the copper strands... (see the image below).
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
Nevertheless, when you have everything soldered and have attached again the tonearm in the bowl with water, the resistance against deforming of the tonearm wiring (8 wires) is far less than the 4 pieces of 30 strands Litz wires before. In fact, it is nearly perfect (the electrical resistance is 0,5 ohm by 90 cm tonearm wiring).
Unfortunately, there is a drawback too... When I trust my ears, there is slightly more noise from the amplifier and the cause must be the 8 wires within the 3 mm inner carbon tube of the armtube. Apparently, there is too few space/isolated air between the wires so there will be some mutual electromagnetic influence. What to do about it?
When I replace the 8 silk winded pieces of Litz wire inside the armtube with 4 solid copper wires (0,25 mm) with a better isolation – like 30 AWG wire wrapping wire – and solder the untwined Litz wires 2 by 2 at each wire wrapping wire just outside the end of the armtube, I have got two enhancements: less “hum” and a further decrease of the capacity of the tonearm wiring (profit for MM cartridges). I even can separate these 4 wires within the 3 mm armtube (inside diameter) by some very small square pieces of wood (like a part of a match). So that’s exactly what I have done (see image below; the Litz wire isn’t yet soldered at the wire wrap wires).
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
Now there is only one thing left. How will someone correctly separate the adjustment of:
- the right angle of the horizontal bar of the bowl;
- the best position of the RCA-connectors in relation to the resistance of the tonearm wiring?
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
We don’t need the correct angle of the horizontal bar when we adjust the right position of the RCA-connectors. To control the adjusted position of the RCA-connectors – the balance of the resistance of the tonearm wiring – is theoretical very easy. When we put the stylus at the middle of the average modulated groove – 103,2 mm from the centre of the spindle – and the roller bar is free from the horizontal bar, the armtube must drift to a position at right angles to the spindle. Fortunately, this not only theoretical, because the first time I tried this “trick”, the tonearm stopped moving exactly at right angles to the spindle.
Thereafter we can adjust the right angle of the horizontal bar with the help of a record (controlling from time to time the position of the tonearm). A transparent right-angled triangle is a perfect tool to control the correct position of the armtube/tonearm. The best position is in the middle of the minimum and maximum angle in relation to a correct movement of the sphere along the trajectory. This link will give you a scalable and printable PDF of the image above.
Last edited:
@Directdriver,
I used a professional A/D converter for the music, but it is mixed with the mono microphone of the video camera (otherwise I expected problems with the copyright of the music). Nevertheless, the stylus of the Ortofon Cadenza Red is an elliptical nude diamond with the radius 8/40 micron. That’s why there is only little distortion when the tonearm is not exactly at right angles to the spindle. But I am not sure about the quality of the sound when the dimensions of the stylus tip are more extreme, like the Cadenza Bronze (r/R = 5/100 µm).
@oshifis,
Look to the image below. You see a pulley on top of a horizontal bar with an attached weight. Although gravity pulls at the pulley, there will be no sideward movement when the bar is truly horizontal.
A rotating record pulls at the stylus of the cartridge like gravity pulls at the pulley. The only reason why a parallel tonearm moves from the outermost to the innermost position of the groove is the push at the tip of the stylus by the outerwall of the spiral groove. Therefore, when I want to eliminate the influence by the push of the outerwall of the groove, I have to incorporate a sideward force that will move the tonearm to the direction of the spindle.
In the image above I only have to lower one of the supports (A or B) to get a sideward force. This is exactly how this tonearm can move in the direction of the spindle. Not perpendicular to a fixed radius line, but at a small angle to the radius line at right angles to the spindle.
Because the distance between 2 adjacent grooves is not a fixed dimension, the tonearm has to correct its position all along the trajectory of the floating sphere. Fortunately the friction between both walls of the groove and the tip of the stylus “will do this job” (see the explanation at EXPLORING: VINYL AUDIO – DIY linear tonearm).
I used a professional A/D converter for the music, but it is mixed with the mono microphone of the video camera (otherwise I expected problems with the copyright of the music). Nevertheless, the stylus of the Ortofon Cadenza Red is an elliptical nude diamond with the radius 8/40 micron. That’s why there is only little distortion when the tonearm is not exactly at right angles to the spindle. But I am not sure about the quality of the sound when the dimensions of the stylus tip are more extreme, like the Cadenza Bronze (r/R = 5/100 µm).
@oshifis,
Look to the image below. You see a pulley on top of a horizontal bar with an attached weight. Although gravity pulls at the pulley, there will be no sideward movement when the bar is truly horizontal.
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
A rotating record pulls at the stylus of the cartridge like gravity pulls at the pulley. The only reason why a parallel tonearm moves from the outermost to the innermost position of the groove is the push at the tip of the stylus by the outerwall of the spiral groove. Therefore, when I want to eliminate the influence by the push of the outerwall of the groove, I have to incorporate a sideward force that will move the tonearm to the direction of the spindle.
In the image above I only have to lower one of the supports (A or B) to get a sideward force. This is exactly how this tonearm can move in the direction of the spindle. Not perpendicular to a fixed radius line, but at a small angle to the radius line at right angles to the spindle.
Because the distance between 2 adjacent grooves is not a fixed dimension, the tonearm has to correct its position all along the trajectory of the floating sphere. Fortunately the friction between both walls of the groove and the tip of the stylus “will do this job” (see the explanation at EXPLORING: VINYL AUDIO – DIY linear tonearm).
Yes I understand your idea: you add a force to the inner groove to compensate the force of the outer groove. But the push of the outer groove is very low if you keep the friction of the pulley at minimum (and you do it by floating the bowl in water; the only friction is between the guiding rod and the vertical bar).
@oshifis,
Well, you are quite right. The balance of the friction between the two walls of the groove is responsible for the right position of the tonearm. Just because every cantilever is fit into a rubber damper. Therefore, both forces at the tip of the stylus align the armtube all along the trajectory perpendicular to a radius line. This radius line is slowly changing because the linear tonearm is not a tangential tonearm (parallel to one radius line). The armtube slightly turns a bit (horizontal rotational point is the centre of the sphere).
Of course there is some kind of a drawback. The armtube cannot move in the direction of the start. It can only slow down or speed up the velocity of the sphere in the direction of the spindle. Therefore the bandwidth of the adjustment of the tonearm is not so “comfortable”. If someone wants everything really perfect, he has to spend a couple of hours – playing records – to fine-tune everything (the right angle of the horizontal bar in relation to the radius line of the stylus at the outermost modulated groove).
The first attempt to design the tonearm was focused upon eliminating the unwanted resonances of the armtube. Therefore the idea of the sphere and the bowl with water. The choose for a linear tonearm – and not a fixed pivot – is because the offset angle of the cartridge is the main reason why fixed pivot tonearms have so much trouble with vibrations of the armtube between cartridge and pivot (the offset angle is the angle between the centrelines of the armtube and the headshell).
It lasted some time before I realised myself that the unmodulated parts of the groove are completely silent. The first time I thought that the volume of the amp was too low. Later I thought that I had – by change – chosen an LP’s with a very good unmodulated groove.
But then I realised myself that noise from the unmodulated parts of the groove are caused by the rigid construction of all the ordinary toneams (groove scrapers). Those rigid constructions are the cause of excessive wear of the groove and the tip of the stylus. And... the cause of some weakness in the reproduction of the full spectrum of frequencies (40 – 20.000 Hz).
Every designer of phono cartridges has a hard job by trying to eliminate all those “flaws”. Nevertheless, when I try different cartridges with this tonearm all the cartridges sound good. A nice balance and the whole spectrum is equal (no accentuation of some frequencies). Of course there is more detail when the quality of the cartridge is better. So don’t think a $30 cartridge will sound like a $3000 cartridge.
Because I use a nice MC cartridge – Ortofon Cadenza Red – I can make a comment about the quality of the combination of this tonearm and a good cartridge. The quality of the reproduced music is comparable to the same music on CD (I have an excellent CD-recorder). The only difference is some fineness. The sound of the record is not really more detailed (my ears cannot detect such small differences), but it is more “musical”, more “natural”. For example, when I listen to the recording of a single concert grand the “reflections” inside the piano are more realistic than the music on CD (same mastertape). Therefore I am curious about the result when a really high end MC cartridge is attached to the tonearm.
Well, you are quite right. The balance of the friction between the two walls of the groove is responsible for the right position of the tonearm. Just because every cantilever is fit into a rubber damper. Therefore, both forces at the tip of the stylus align the armtube all along the trajectory perpendicular to a radius line. This radius line is slowly changing because the linear tonearm is not a tangential tonearm (parallel to one radius line). The armtube slightly turns a bit (horizontal rotational point is the centre of the sphere).
Of course there is some kind of a drawback. The armtube cannot move in the direction of the start. It can only slow down or speed up the velocity of the sphere in the direction of the spindle. Therefore the bandwidth of the adjustment of the tonearm is not so “comfortable”. If someone wants everything really perfect, he has to spend a couple of hours – playing records – to fine-tune everything (the right angle of the horizontal bar in relation to the radius line of the stylus at the outermost modulated groove).
The first attempt to design the tonearm was focused upon eliminating the unwanted resonances of the armtube. Therefore the idea of the sphere and the bowl with water. The choose for a linear tonearm – and not a fixed pivot – is because the offset angle of the cartridge is the main reason why fixed pivot tonearms have so much trouble with vibrations of the armtube between cartridge and pivot (the offset angle is the angle between the centrelines of the armtube and the headshell).
It lasted some time before I realised myself that the unmodulated parts of the groove are completely silent. The first time I thought that the volume of the amp was too low. Later I thought that I had – by change – chosen an LP’s with a very good unmodulated groove.
But then I realised myself that noise from the unmodulated parts of the groove are caused by the rigid construction of all the ordinary toneams (groove scrapers). Those rigid constructions are the cause of excessive wear of the groove and the tip of the stylus. And... the cause of some weakness in the reproduction of the full spectrum of frequencies (40 – 20.000 Hz).
Every designer of phono cartridges has a hard job by trying to eliminate all those “flaws”. Nevertheless, when I try different cartridges with this tonearm all the cartridges sound good. A nice balance and the whole spectrum is equal (no accentuation of some frequencies). Of course there is more detail when the quality of the cartridge is better. So don’t think a $30 cartridge will sound like a $3000 cartridge.
Because I use a nice MC cartridge – Ortofon Cadenza Red – I can make a comment about the quality of the combination of this tonearm and a good cartridge. The quality of the reproduced music is comparable to the same music on CD (I have an excellent CD-recorder). The only difference is some fineness. The sound of the record is not really more detailed (my ears cannot detect such small differences), but it is more “musical”, more “natural”. For example, when I listen to the recording of a single concert grand the “reflections” inside the piano are more realistic than the music on CD (same mastertape). Therefore I am curious about the result when a really high end MC cartridge is attached to the tonearm.
I had promised to post some pictures. Here is one of the untwined tonearm wiring to show the flexibility when it is not bended during soldering, etc. (it drops down like a rope).
The second one is the inside of the bowl. Those strange green/brown colours are caused by the glue I used to fix the ice cream tub into the housing. You can see that the horizontal bar is only slightly bended. About 2 degrees and I bended the bar a bit at the backside of the middle of the length (according to the trajectory of the sphere). The rubber “stops” shows that this bowl is a bit too long for the trajectory. Nevertheless, when I lower the VTF in the future, the trajectory of the sphere will become larger.
The last one is the bowl from aside. I have removed the armlift. Visible behind the cartridge is the wire wrap wiring I have used this time. Maybe I will renew all the soldered connections because plating the ends of the Liz wire with solder – before soldering the connection – was a bit “clumsy”. This time I will use some very fine sandpaper to wipe off the isolation at the end of every strand of wire. Just to secure that every strand of the tonearm wiring is connected to the amplifier.
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
The second one is the inside of the bowl. Those strange green/brown colours are caused by the glue I used to fix the ice cream tub into the housing. You can see that the horizontal bar is only slightly bended. About 2 degrees and I bended the bar a bit at the backside of the middle of the length (according to the trajectory of the sphere). The rubber “stops” shows that this bowl is a bit too long for the trajectory. Nevertheless, when I lower the VTF in the future, the trajectory of the sphere will become larger.
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
The last one is the bowl from aside. I have removed the armlift. Visible behind the cartridge is the wire wrap wiring I have used this time. Maybe I will renew all the soldered connections because plating the ends of the Liz wire with solder – before soldering the connection – was a bit “clumsy”. This time I will use some very fine sandpaper to wipe off the isolation at the end of every strand of wire. Just to secure that every strand of the tonearm wiring is connected to the amplifier.
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
@oshifis,
Theoretical there can exist nearly infinite trajectories from the outside of the record to the innermost groove. The trajectory of the sphere in this image is a straight line (red dotted line from A1 to C1). The angle of this trajectory in the image is 6 degrees when the tonearm is at the position A – A2. Unfortunately, in position C – C2, the angle is increased to nearly 12 degrees. With other words, the tonearm has to slow down the velocity of the sphere a lot to keep the stylus at right angles to the spindle. But when we bend the straight line a bit in such a way that the tonearm has the same angle all along the trajectory A1 – C1, the tonearm will keep the right velocity in a more easy way. This link shows a bended trajectory all along the line A1 – C1.
The benefit is an increase of possible angles of the horizontal bar/bowl that will function properly. Nevertheless, when I adjust the angle of a straight horizontal bar very accurate, the tonearm will keep the right track too.
@Arch Stanton,
The thin copper wire is to ground the carbon armtube (to avoid an audible “hum” when I touch the tonearm). Therefore I put a bit salt in the water so it conducts electrons (the water is connected to the ground of the pre-amp; see this image). It is necessary because the carbon armtube is a conductor too (500 mm carbon tube has an electric resistance of nearly 200 ohm).
Theoretical there can exist nearly infinite trajectories from the outside of the record to the innermost groove. The trajectory of the sphere in this image is a straight line (red dotted line from A1 to C1). The angle of this trajectory in the image is 6 degrees when the tonearm is at the position A – A2. Unfortunately, in position C – C2, the angle is increased to nearly 12 degrees. With other words, the tonearm has to slow down the velocity of the sphere a lot to keep the stylus at right angles to the spindle. But when we bend the straight line a bit in such a way that the tonearm has the same angle all along the trajectory A1 – C1, the tonearm will keep the right velocity in a more easy way. This link shows a bended trajectory all along the line A1 – C1.
The benefit is an increase of possible angles of the horizontal bar/bowl that will function properly. Nevertheless, when I adjust the angle of a straight horizontal bar very accurate, the tonearm will keep the right track too.
@Arch Stanton,
The thin copper wire is to ground the carbon armtube (to avoid an audible “hum” when I touch the tonearm). Therefore I put a bit salt in the water so it conducts electrons (the water is connected to the ground of the pre-amp; see this image). It is necessary because the carbon armtube is a conductor too (500 mm carbon tube has an electric resistance of nearly 200 ohm).
@Arch Stanton,
It is classic mechanics, verified with the help of simple experiments. The biggest profit – from my point of view – is the fact that the tonearm is very cheap and easy to construct, while it is a high end tonearm, singular in its way. In fact, when someone wants to DIY a fixed pivot tonearm, it will costs far more money and effort. So I hope that a lot of people will try to make this tonearm by themselves. Just because it is amazing to hear beautiful realistic music.
If you don’t mind I will clarify something about the long distance between the counterweight and the point of rotation (the centre of the sphere).
Fixed pivot tonearms have the counterweight near the pivot. Nevertheless, this tonearm is quite the opposite: minimizing the mass of the counterweight by transposing the mass far away from the pivot. See this image of the tonearm.
The first drawing shows the distance between the cenre of rotation and the centre of mass. As a result the tonearm will “roll across” more than necessary. The second drawing shows the solution: just a bit of water inside the sphere and the counterweight can be pushed a bit upwards. Because the water level in the bowl is raised by the supply of some water to get the centre of rotation back again at the surface of the record.
It is classic mechanics, verified with the help of simple experiments. The biggest profit – from my point of view – is the fact that the tonearm is very cheap and easy to construct, while it is a high end tonearm, singular in its way. In fact, when someone wants to DIY a fixed pivot tonearm, it will costs far more money and effort. So I hope that a lot of people will try to make this tonearm by themselves. Just because it is amazing to hear beautiful realistic music.
If you don’t mind I will clarify something about the long distance between the counterweight and the point of rotation (the centre of the sphere).
Fixed pivot tonearms have the counterweight near the pivot. Nevertheless, this tonearm is quite the opposite: minimizing the mass of the counterweight by transposing the mass far away from the pivot. See this image of the tonearm.
The first drawing shows the distance between the cenre of rotation and the centre of mass. As a result the tonearm will “roll across” more than necessary. The second drawing shows the solution: just a bit of water inside the sphere and the counterweight can be pushed a bit upwards. Because the water level in the bowl is raised by the supply of some water to get the centre of rotation back again at the surface of the record.
Sorry, I have made a mistake. To put some water inside the sphere to get the centre of rotation and the centre of mass at the same spot, isn’t necessary (that was before, when the distance between record and armtube was about 10 mm). Because there are 2 holes in the sphere, I can attach a thread around the roller bar at 4 mm from the armtube (centre of rotation). When I lift up the tonearm (without tonearm wiring), it is possible to balance the tonearm horizontal by the counterweight (because the tonearm is rotated 90 degrees).
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
I have uploaded a new Youtube video to show the proper operation of the tonearm.
The first one: DIY linear tonearm (new principle) - YouTube
The new video: DIY linear tonearm (new principle) part 2 - YouTube
I think this was the last post about information of the tonearm and turntable (nearly everything is explained).
New post will discuss the phono cartridge.
The first one: DIY linear tonearm (new principle) - YouTube
The new video: DIY linear tonearm (new principle) part 2 - YouTube
I think this was the last post about information of the tonearm and turntable (nearly everything is explained).
New post will discuss the phono cartridge.
Arm path
I edited a possible arm path in Visio. The three circles at the left represent the inner radius (65 mm), middle (106.5 mm) and outer radius (150 mm) of an LP. The overlapping large circle (Thales circle) shows the path of the stylus. The three 200 mm long arrows are a randomly selected length of arm in three positions. The ellipse is the path of the arm anchor (vertical bar). I don't know how is the ellipse determined, it might be completely wrong.
I edited a possible arm path in Visio. The three circles at the left represent the inner radius (65 mm), middle (106.5 mm) and outer radius (150 mm) of an LP. The overlapping large circle (Thales circle) shows the path of the stylus. The three 200 mm long arrows are a randomly selected length of arm in three positions. The ellipse is the path of the arm anchor (vertical bar). I don't know how is the ellipse determined, it might be completely wrong.
Attachments
A portion of the ellipse (from arrow point 65mm to 150mm since no need for the stylus to travel to the spindle) can be a portion of a circle which its center creates a pivot, and that's the concept of the Birch patent and somewhat similar to the Schroeder LT tonearm concept. Tom's tonearm requires no precise guiding mechanism as the stylus will find its tangency by the groove. Nice drawing!
@oshifis, the reply posted by directdriver is correct. The tonearm “guides itself” by means of the friction between both walls of the groove. Because the tip of the stylus has properties, there is a equilibrium between the friction at both sides of the tip of the stylus by the pull of the record. The balance is at right angles to the spindle. Therefore, when we increase the mass of the tonearm, we decrease the ability of the tonearm to react to the variable distance between the grooves.
@pcb121055,
At the moment I am assembling (= gluing) everything together (second prototype; still without coils). This one isn’t so big. The width of the cantilever is 20 mm.
The housing of the cartridge is made of transparent 2 mm polycarbonate, the cantilever is made of 0,7 mm carbon tube. The stylus is a spherical diamond (just for testing). When everything works as expected and the cartridge is connected to the amplifier, I will change the stylus to an elliptical nude diamond 8 – 40 micron (like the Ortofon Cadenza red I use at the moment). Because I have to compare the quality of the output/sound.
Most problems about friction, mass, etc. are solved. The only “headache” is the small disturbing of the magnetic force of the unmodulated channel when the other channel is “at full swing” (because both channels are part of the same rigid construction (= cantilever + stylus). A vinyl cutter machine has the same draw back too.
At the moment I am assembling (= gluing) everything together (second prototype; still without coils). This one isn’t so big. The width of the cantilever is 20 mm.
The housing of the cartridge is made of transparent 2 mm polycarbonate, the cantilever is made of 0,7 mm carbon tube. The stylus is a spherical diamond (just for testing). When everything works as expected and the cartridge is connected to the amplifier, I will change the stylus to an elliptical nude diamond 8 – 40 micron (like the Ortofon Cadenza red I use at the moment). Because I have to compare the quality of the output/sound.
Most problems about friction, mass, etc. are solved. The only “headache” is the small disturbing of the magnetic force of the unmodulated channel when the other channel is “at full swing” (because both channels are part of the same rigid construction (= cantilever + stylus). A vinyl cutter machine has the same draw back too.
- Status
- This old topic is closed. If you want to reopen this topic, contact a moderator using the "Report Post" button.