Rega VTF

A shame they're doing that. It's not like the arm is $50.

 

It would be a great tonearm otherwise. My RB202 has such low bearing friction(and no slop) it is hard for me to cue it. It has no 'feel'.

 

Here Breuer (manufacturer of Breuer Dynamic tonearms in Switzerland) recommended half the VTF with the counterweight and half with the spring loaded VTF dial. He should know!

 

I had the anti skate at 0.9 for my Nag 110, but now with my Nag 200 I have it closer to the 1.75 that my VTF is also set to. Might be a little too much indeed, but according to the deadwax standard it should be good at that setting.

 

It’s funny how Rega has been making very popular tonearms for over 35 years now and we all know better than they do.

 

I certainly do not know how to actually make a tonearm even as well as they do. I do know that it makes zero reasonable sense to build a current tonearm that does not allow someone to adjust the anti-skate, aside from possibly cost reduction for Rega and simplicity to a user that doesn't want to fuss with adjustments.

 

Here's an interesting article about the spring in the RB-300. The author used an accelerometer to measure vibrations with the VTF dial in various positions.

We Measure a Rega RB300, Part II

 

Several years ago & having read 'expert' end-user forum advice about this, I tried the various zero or max settings on an RB303, using a digital gauge to the set VTF.

Try as I might I couldn't detect any real difference so stayed with the 'spring disengaged' setup until I purchased an Audiomods V arm and happened to mention these various theories to Jeff Spall, the owner (very familiar with Rega arms). He advised me to use the spring as Rega intended on an unmodified arm, they had designed it this way for a reason and the spring should always be under some tension.

As his own variants are highly regarded & from my own experience with the V, I figure that he actually knows what he is talking about so I trust his advice as an engineer.

 

I was very curious abut this idea and I think I'll leave as is. Dial to 0, float with counterweight, dial to desired setting, fine tune with digital scale.