In 1981 Robert Pardee tested µ for mint records from various brands, using various commercial products, with mixed results. Friction coefficient, µ, was measured before/after cleaning.
Here's the result with water/detergent, the control.
Determination of Sliding Friction Between Stylus and Record Groove, Robert P. Pardee, Ball Corporation, Aerospace Division, Boulder, Co USA. JAES Vol 29 No 12 Dec 1981.
"....The comparison in Table 2 show that thoroughly cleaning a record with detergent solution will, in most cases, cause an increase in friction, sometimes a large increase. And the effect seems to vary from one brand of record to another. For example, cleaning had essentially no effect on µ of brands E and E; caused a slight µ increase on brands F and G, and caused a rather large µ increases on brand C."
Record Manufacturer, side No, µ(mint) µ(after cleaning)
A 1 0.27 0.29
A 2 0.26 0.29
A 1 0.38 0.40
A 2 0.38 0.40
A 1 0.43 0.39
B 1 0.34 0.34
C 1 0.24 0.34
C 1 0.24 0.64
D 1 0.29 0.30
D 1 0.28 0.37
D 2 0.28 0.36
E 1 0.27 0.27
F 1 0.26 0.29
F 1 0.22 0.23
G 1 0.15 0.19 "
This cropped up in post #256, and IIRC SY mooted whether variation in outcome after cleaning might be due to an uncontrolled variable: time between cleaning and testing, allowing for drying. But at face value, the results are consistent with my experience, and also with variable success in cleaning records with simple mixtures, especially detergents and alcohols.
Having explored claims from some posters that certain commercial regimes can consistently reduce surface noise, after reasonable questioning I concluded the most successful cleaning regimes seem to use 'patent' mixtures, whose exact composition is unknown but one might suppose include an agent which is effective at reducing friction, or at least be ineffective at increasing friction by whatever means that happens. No-one has posted before-after cleaning friction coefficient µ for regimes claimed to be successful at reducing surface noise.
In brief, I suspect consistently successful regimes use a mixture including an agent which brings about permanent reduction in friction. Otherwise, IME, one ends up with variable outcome, as Pardee documented. Excluding the obvious dirt/debris removal, of course: I mean for mint or clean records in good condition.
Sometimes, according to Pardee and IME, cleaning can bring about similar effects to wet playback, ie increase in subsequent µ and surface noise. But whether such effect has the same cause, I don't know.
LD
Last edited:
And fascinatingly no one on the ultrasonic cleaning thread has noted an increase in noise after cleaning!
This suggests some sort of release agent on the stampers which acts as a lubricant.
Any old (or new) record stampers, who might elucidate, lurking here ?
I suspect it's human nature to expect a positive outcome, otherwise I can't explain why no-one apparently reports a spectrum of outcomes from cleaning using simple agents. That is certainly my experience.
Here's what Pardee found for use of agents, from the same paper :
The record preservatives in Table 1 are seen to vary widely in their friction reducing properties. None of those tested caused the stylus/groove friction to increase, but the commercial product E and the experimental product I produced no significant effects on friction. In contrast, commercial D and experimental G, H, and J produced substantial friction reductions.....
Table 1:
Record Preservative/Mint Record/Treated Record
Commercial
A 0.33 0.23
B 0.30 0.23
B 0.31 0.25
B 0.34 0.27
C 0.31 0.29
D 0.29 0.14
D 0.28 0.17
D 0.30 0.18
E 0.29 0.29
F 0.30 0.21
Experimental
G 0.33 0.11
H 0.35 0.18
I 0.34 0.34
J 0.30 0.15
The secret is in the agent, its compatibility with the specific vinyl, methinks.
LD
Here's what Pardee found for use of agents, from the same paper :
The record preservatives in Table 1 are seen to vary widely in their friction reducing properties. None of those tested caused the stylus/groove friction to increase, but the commercial product E and the experimental product I produced no significant effects on friction. In contrast, commercial D and experimental G, H, and J produced substantial friction reductions.....
Table 1:
Record Preservative/Mint Record/Treated Record
Commercial
A 0.33 0.23
B 0.30 0.23
B 0.31 0.25
B 0.34 0.27
C 0.31 0.29
D 0.29 0.14
D 0.28 0.17
D 0.30 0.18
E 0.29 0.29
F 0.30 0.21
Experimental
G 0.33 0.11
H 0.35 0.18
I 0.34 0.34
J 0.30 0.15
The secret is in the agent, its compatibility with the specific vinyl, methinks.
LD
Perhaps. Well, something about the vinyl surface can be altered by the act of cleaning for sure. AFAIK strictly there is no separate mold release in the classic sense: the vinyl mix is self releasing and includes all that's necessary for that. But, the same principle applies as to whether any such release compound can be removed by cleaning, whether it is separate or part of the vinyl mix, I suppose. I think it makes sense, esp as to vinyl variability and ageing after poor storage sometimes.
LD
Plasticiser bloom? Even when washed off new should bloom up within a few hours. Washing with caustic products then immediately playing will run the risk of brittle vinyl being damaged. Testing this without 100 records to kill could be a challenge 🙂
Pardee did not reveal the identity of any of the agents tested, neither commercial nor experimental. Except for the control group, detergent/distilled water. At least not in the paper.........
That there are agents capable of altering friction, including reducing it, possibly explains claims of how cleaning already clean or mint records might often bring about improvement to surface noise, IMO, and sometimes make it worse depending on the agent IME. All complicated by the possibility that dirt and debris might also play a part in practice, of course, but Pardee's control group would have taken care of that.
LD
My 2p worth on headshell inertia and tonearm flex.
Tonearms have all the resonant self flex modes of a classical beam. A series of resonances that aren't equally spaced in frequency, starting at perhaps c200Hz with perhaps 10 or so frequencies in the audioband where the tonearm's mechanical impedance can be very low indeed, ie easy to bend. The series of resonances is rather like that of a tubular bell, and depending on material and dimensions can be euphonic or dissonant.
For this reason, it's more stable for the cartridge if most of the mass is at the headshell, or in the cartridge itself. This mass has inertia which presents a uniform mechanical impedance versus frequency in opposition to the cantilever's suspension moving - which the tonearm doesn't !
So much cartridge mass in a light arm is a good way, in principle, to achieve appropriate overall effective mass. This is probably why the DL-103 is reported to work well in the SME 3009 II, it wouldn't surprise me.
For the purposes of LF stability, it doesn't matter whether damping is in the cartridge suspension end, or at the pivot end. At sub audio LF, the tonearm is effectively rigid; whereas over the audioband there are many spot frequencies where it is not.
LD
As the 3009 was often used with SPUs would not suprise me. It was the SIII at 5.5g that suprised me as being good.
A few weeks back I did find some nice animations of bending modes in a cantilever. Of course failed to save the link. Must dig more. It's an area I did not excel at as a student, but should revisit now I have a use for the knowledge.
Just ordered an S-120 stylus. May get the second table up and running sometime soon. Well have to as need the corner its sitting in for the miniDSP 🙂
A few weeks back I did find some nice animations of bending modes in a cantilever. Of course failed to save the link. Must dig more. It's an area I did not excel at as a student, but should revisit now I have a use for the knowledge.
Just ordered an S-120 stylus. May get the second table up and running sometime soon. Well have to as need the corner its sitting in for the miniDSP 🙂
It’s the internal damping that titanium possesses which makes SME Series III/DL-103 work.
In terms of stiffness, damping and low weight, the best choice would have been Magnesium-Aluminum alloy but it’s difficult thus expensive to manufacture an arm out of such alloy
Two days ago I broke the cantilever of my DL-103. “It was good but now it’s over”.
For the foreseeable future I have to turn back to my MMs
George
In terms of stiffness, damping and low weight, the best choice would have been Magnesium-Aluminum alloy but it’s difficult thus expensive to manufacture an arm out of such alloy
Two days ago I broke the cantilever of my DL-103. “It was good but now it’s over”.
For the foreseeable future I have to turn back to my MMs
George
Oops I meant the III, of course. Hope you enjoy exploring the S-120. Yes, bending beams is one of those ultra boring topics that undergrad tutors used to torture and improve the maths of their victims. And then, one day, an application like this crops up. Fortunately there's lots of tutorials and worked examples on the web, though they never seem to quite explore the exact scenario one is interested in, but seek and ye will find !
Yes, material choice greatly affects the nature of arm self-resonances, including Q of the peaks/troughs in mechanical impedance at spot frequencies over the audioband. Intrinsic damping crops up in the loss modulus of the material. Or surface coatings, such as paint or platings. Whereas the natural resonant series itself, which can sound good/bad/ugly, depends on dimensions, as well as material elastic moduli and density. Like bell-making, in practice it's mostly art I think.
Oh no, how horrible. DL103 ticks the boxes for me, and is a mythbuster, an iconoclast, or at least an inspiration to explore what's really going on with excellent vinyl playback IMO.
LD
Last edited:
This may be why, after getting a good deal on an SME345 20+years ago I have felt no need to look for anything else, at least until now when I am setting up a second table.
🙁 sucky. I've been cartridge dreaming again as there are some interesting potentials on ebay that need some work but would scratch an itch.
Doug: Dunno if you saw the email I sent you a few days back, but trying to understand what ortofon mean with their compliance measurements as they say 'dynamic' but don't quote a frequency!
Bill
Hi Bill, apols I only just caught up.
I think historically Ortofon explicitly stated static compliance, ie the spring constant under a static load, which is handy when working out flying height and getting the cartridge level when varying VTF I suppose. They also stated dynamic compliance, which AFIAK is derived from observed cart-arm LF resonance, which is handy when matching arms by selecting resonant f, as was/is the vogue.
These days, I think Ortofon state just dynamic compliance, which has the same meaning as their old dynamic compliance, ie derived from resonant f of cart-arm LF system. At least the published figures more or less match the experimentally derived spring constant, and so compliance, IME.
I think static and dynamic compliance when presented this way sometimes differ because elastomers can be odd in the way they stretch, and have a time factor for relaxation.
HTH! And happy new year to you too !
LD
Thanks, I had assumed that then suddenly got confused after trawling through one of your vinylengine discussions on 100Hz compliance as the DJ carts, being in the 9-11 range (low for an MM) could 'just' have been quoting 100Hz not 10Hz compliance, at which point all my calculations would have been out.
And back to angsting about tonearms. The Kenwood KD-550 that was my fathers before he gave up on vinyl and will be used as the mono rig and for general experimenting came with an OEM arm. Now I've always been unsure about S-shaped arms with detachable headshells, probably because of my love for the modern SME arms so have been considering replacing it. I can't afford a second 309, so my choices are limited to an audiomods build it yourself or something second hand. Trawling ebay found a few that piqued my curiosity including an SME 3009 III with damping trough at not silly money. Then it hit me. Due to my somewhat extreme jump from an RB250 to SME back in the mid 90s I never bothered investigating what actually matters in a tonearm and how to actually measure things on a tonearm you have.
Realise this is potentially drifting even further off topic than we are, but as we are exploring some fairly esoteric stuff in search of noise reduction figured here was as good a place as any to ask.
(and I realise the RB300/audiomods does fall at the hurdle of azimuth adjustment. Owners of EMT carts will chortle as it doesn't bother them but otherwise I can't help thinking that, if you have some time and the tools that £295 on the classic II kit is very hard to beat without spending 3x. audio mods Rega arm conversions)
Realise this is potentially drifting even further off topic than we are, but as we are exploring some fairly esoteric stuff in search of noise reduction figured here was as good a place as any to ask.
(and I realise the RB300/audiomods does fall at the hurdle of azimuth adjustment. Owners of EMT carts will chortle as it doesn't bother them but otherwise I can't help thinking that, if you have some time and the tools that £295 on the classic II kit is very hard to beat without spending 3x. audio mods Rega arm conversions)
Indeed. I think, as far as surface noise is concerned, the biggest contributing factor from the tonearm/headshell comes from capability/ease of adjusting azimuth and VTA. Or lack of....... it becomes more relevant and critical with fine line contact radius styli IME. It can be very fussy as to a sweet spot, and tracking offset angle/overhang too can become a matter of relative precision.
In the immortal words of Shaggy, 'it wasn't me!' I'm one of those who doesn't read or participate in VE at all......
An upside of low compliance carts is higher suspension damping, which demands higher VTFs as discussed on this thread. In turn this demotes the sensibility of having fine radius styli, probably due to wear issues, and so places less demand on precision of alignment for lowest surface noise I think.
Contrary to common wisdom, I think the main intrinsic benefit from fine radius styli lies in hf trackability at high levels, rather than improved harmonic distortion at high frequencies (which is also true). This is because pinch effect is, in fact, associated with steep groove angles (ie high programme levels) rather than high groove curvature as per common wisdom. Pinch effect has maxima when groove angle is steepest, and by definition groove curvature is zero at that instant. Squeezing the stylus up is no problem, but keeping it in contact with groove walls on the way down is the challenge, due to inertia and the mechanical impedance of the cantilever and all the factors touched upon in this thread. The upshot is, to realise potential surface noise advantage of, say, spherical styli, problems with pinch effect induced hf high programme level trackability have to be overcome through suspension/cantilever design. Then the overall performance package of a DL-103 or S-120, low compliance sphericals, can be very surprisingly good indeed, when all factors are taken into account, including surface noise, trackability, and harmonic distortion etc etc.
LD
Hmm, will mull some more, and resist buying arms to test in the meantime. Turns out the kenwood OEM headshell does have azimuth adjustment so it may live after all.
Might not have been VE but there were some long threads from you on one forum, before you left and had your account disabled (or maybe when they allowed guests). You spend at least 4 pages fencing with someone on the use of 100Hz measurements and what you could infer back to static compliance. I should remember to bookmark these when I find them !
Edit : quote from an audiocircle post
Now of course there may be two LuckyDogs who like vinyl ... Don't really care about what happened but I must try and assemble the good stuff into one place for review. The world should not lose loading a cartridge with another cartridge! 🙂
Might not have been VE but there were some long threads from you on one forum, before you left and had your account disabled (or maybe when they allowed guests). You spend at least 4 pages fencing with someone on the use of 100Hz measurements and what you could infer back to static compliance. I should remember to bookmark these when I find them !
Edit : quote from an audiocircle post
Now of course there may be two LuckyDogs who like vinyl ... Don't really care about what happened but I must try and assemble the good stuff into one place for review. The world should not lose loading a cartridge with another cartridge! 🙂
Last edited:
😡😡
But maybe a good excuse to get a ruby cantilever & Paratrace stylus from Expert Pickups 🙂
________________
Actually it does.
Damping at the cartridge (or the SHURE brush) simply damps the 2nd order response of cartridge/arm. Response at LF is ALWAYS less than undamped.
Damping at pivot converts the 2nd order response to a wonky 1st order response. Response at the 'peak' may be less but VLF response is increased.
Holman shows examples.