I did an anti-skate test last night with a LASERDISC

Skating force is created from the friction of the stylus in the groove. On a blank record, the only friction is from the tip of the stylus. When in a groove, there is much more friction generated from the stylus rubbing against the walls of the groove.

I don't see any way a blank, grooveless record can help you set your anti-skating force.

 

Boils down to whose advice one chooses to follow.

On one hand: Peter Ledermann and Frank Schroder. Ledermann describes the method here: https://www.sound-smith.com/faq/how-do-i-adjust-anti-skating-my-cartridge

On the other: guys who don't build world renowned cartridges and tone arms.

 

All you have to do is try it. All of us old vinyl hounds can't be wrong. For example, if you set your stylus down in middle of a blank record and it goes skating off the record (not to center), you need to adjust. Like others mentioned, I like to get the stylus pretty stable (yes, you can do this without grooves) with little to no drift in either direction. Doing this and proper VTF will ensure the least wear on the records.

 

Be sure and get a blank side with a perfectly centered hole.

 

I will also add, that upon opening up my turntable, i notice the spring for the anti skate, it seems as you move the tonearm inward, this spring lengthens, which would match up with what is being said that the anti skating ramps up on the inner grooves

 

i don't see any scratches at all on the laserdisc afterwards

 

Nice, and meaningless. I have great respect for Ledermann and both own and enjoy his cartridges. I also own a VPI turntable. Harry Weisfeld famously doesn't use anti-skating force with his turntables and a says simple twist of the tonearm wire is sufficient. So who should I believe, Harry Weisfeld or Peter Ledermann? Both are great students of turntables and cartridges. They are telling me totally different things. I choose instead to believe the physics behind why skating force exists in the first place, which is friction on the stylus from the walls of the groove, which gets expressed as a pull inward on the tonearm because the headshell is offset.

I have tried it, many times, and find it doesn't work for me.

On the other hand, I have a way of adjusting anti-skating force that does work. It is the mnemonic device, "Left lower/right raise." I listen for mistracking in the right or left channel and raise or lower my anti-skating force as I hear it. This mnemonic device comes from the left channel being on the inside of the groove. Skating force pulls the tonearm in. Anti-skating force pulls the tonearm out. If the anti-skating force is set too high, it is pulling out too hard on the tonearm, which then means the stylus is not making good contact with the inner groove wall. You'll get mistracking in the left channel. Too little anti-skating force will cause mistracking on the outer wall of the groove, which is the right channel.

 

The plastic laser disc is softer than a vinyl record, I don't know why you don't have the stylus scratching it. I have tried it before, as I said I use a blank record to set the balance on a air bearing tangental arm. On a blank spinning record you don't want it to walk in any direction, this way with a record the groove walls control the movement. I found I could not use a laser disc to do this because it's to soft, creating more drag and friction. I do use them as platter dust covers.

 

Skating forces are at the highest at the outside grooves. They decrease very slightly until about 2/3rd of the way playing through, them increase ever so slightly again but are never higher as the outside grooves.

 

If you are curious, here is the a-ha moment when I got the how and why skating force exists. There are pictures and diagrams. It's really pretty simple. Maybe it will give you the same insight. There is some clean-up in later posts on my misuse of vectors but the necessary physics is still correct enough in this first post. Reading a bit further will make everything straight.

VPI Anti-Skate Contraption

 

Wow - that's exactly what I use! I was about to comment, but you already did. I know it's rare to find a blank 12" side, but I can't believe anyone else uses the same one.

 

It's kind of hard explaining to people to use their own dam ears, and quit letting the internet tell them everything to do. Up thread a Youtube vid by a kid still wet behind the ears, and he's instructing others LOL

You will not see me starting a thread asking how to fix IGD. Maybe this is a common problem because we are seeing so many setting anti skate with a blank disc.

 

ok thanks for that, I just known when I looked at the spring, that in the tonearm rest position, the spring was slacked, then as you moved the tonearm towards the drop point, that spring LENGTHENED and got more tense

 

i am not SETTING it with a blank disc at all

I have followed Technics and set the tracking and anti-skating to same value, I am not hearing any wild distortions, I wanted to see what would happen

 

maybe not enough tracking force?

 

Everyone in this thread is saying something totally different, figures

 

That link is very helpful thanks

After reading this, on the blank surface, the stylus is moving very slowly inward compared to being in groove, as this states

 

That's what you get when you have a discussion.

 

Yeah maybe on your part,
Anti skate is set to zero when zero balancing the arm and setting up the table and then reset to where it's needed after all other steps have been adjusted.

 

well I am certainly not going to be setting things for listening to a laserdisc

 

Well that's because there might be more ways to skin a cat than one. Someways might work better, someways might work better for different people, and or tables. Not all tables are the same and not all goals are the same in vinyl playback. It's best to be exposed to different principles, equipment and tools to get a vinyl front end working good, it's call gaining hands on experience. I did say hands on experience, you tried this laser disc and brought it to the forum. I hope your getting something out of this thread.

 

definitely thanks

 

So where are you more likely to hear distortions due to bad anti-skate, the inner grooves or outers?

Ok this makes sense:
https://www.analogmagik.com/antiskate
One must realize that the force exerted on the stylus is not linear, therefore the amount of anti-skating force required will be different depending on the relative location of the cartridge towards the record spindle. The curve is somewhat of a parabolic shape, with the skating force higher at the outer groove than at the inner groove, and lowest in the middle. Some tonearms designs have a mechanism which will increase anti-skating force gradually to counteract the non-linear nature of the centripetal force.




Optimizing anti-skating adjustment at the outer grooves where the skating force is the strongest will cause over-compensation across the inner groves. This is why the anti-skating track is placed near the inner grooves.

 

Note special instructions for VPI arms. Might explain why our man above gets better results with a different method. Whatever works is what’s best!

 

I love this post. There is nothing like listening to the wisest voices around and then doing it for yourself.

44 years ago, when CES was in Chicago in July, I was at the Blackstone Hotel, going from display room to display room. The Dahlquist DQ-10 was a hot speaker at that time. I owned a pair. They were also a favorite of the tweakers, as the speaker was easily modified and benefited from many mods. Mine were a like a car modified for the track. They remained all of Jon Dahlquist's original design but like any good hot rod, were changed to get better performance.

The money man for Dahlquist was Saul Marantz. He was that Marantz, the reason the name is on the electronics. I walked into the Dahlquist booth and Mr. Marantz was the only person there. He saw a pack of cigarettes in my breast pocket and asked for one. I gave him a cig and lit one myself. We sat on the hotel room's AC unit and sweated in the open window. It was blazingly hot that day. We shared a cigarette and Dahlquist mods. He had tweaks I hadn't tried. I had one he hadn't tried. "The engineers are always messing around with my speakers," he said.

It was a wonderful moment. As I walked to the next booth, I both celebrated talking to a legend and the realization my experience was as good as anybody's. I learned that day to trust my ears and tweaks and not to believe in anyone just because they had a better title. I would certainly take their advice but, if in the end, my experience was different, that was the direction I was going to go.