Is My New Cart' OK Like This....?

Quick question for you all, a couple of months ago I swapped out the Goldring Elektra cart for an Ortofon OM 10 Super (I think). Now when I swapped them over I noticed that the Ortofon was quite a bit taller than the Goldring, this meant that the arm lift mechanism barely lifted the stylus off the vinyl at all, in fact when lifted the stylus is not much more than 1mm above it.

Anyway I set the cart and yes it is a huge improvement, but my slight concern is that the arm is putting a lot more force onto the vinyl (due to the angle the arm may be hitting it at, i.e. slightly raised at the front) than the previous cart. Am I just being paranoid? I would imagine that if I had an arm I could adjust the height of I'd probably wind it up a few notches (or whatever you do – never had one that can rise), unfortunately the arm on the Goldring GR-1 doesn't have that facility. There is nothing wrong with the sound at all and there is next to no end of side distortion, but I'm not sure if I'm doing any damage by using a much taller cart…..

Cheers,
Rick

 

I'd doubt that the angle would have a significant effect on tracking force (you did reset the tracking force?).

Some people argue that vertical tracking angle is almost a life-or-death matter, others have a different opinion (look at what Geoff Husband wrote a few months back over at TNT). My take is that if it all looks about level you're probably OKish soundwise (but from your description I suspect that it doesn't look level). Personally I'd be concerned that this minimal clearance makes you vulnerable to knocking off the stylus in a moment of forgetfullness.

But if there really is no way of changing the pillar height, you're screwed. Had it been the other way round, some packing pieces would have saved the day (although there are people who don't like those either).

 

The angle you describe won't affect tracking force. Setting the tracking force will set the tracking force - ie. if you use a stylus balance, then if it says (say) 2g, then the force is 2g. If you're using the tracking force gauge built into the arm then there will be an error, but only slight.

A crude bit of maths says that a 20mm change in height (ie. very big) on a 9" (229mm) arm is about 5 degrees this would give about a 0.4% error in a spring-loaded tracking force device.

What is does do is affect the vertical tracking angle (vta) by 5 degrees (it's not really vta, but is generally referred to as vta) and Dick Bowman's comments apply. Another thread somewhere in zerogain (I think by 3dsonics) makes reference to how cutting angles have varied over the years. Somewhere in this thread I think

 

Thanks for your replies chaps,

Dick - Now that I've got home I can tell that the arm really is pretty flat if I'm honest, as such I hope that it's all OK, it certainly sounds it. I've set the cart up properly with tracking force and alignment reset before fitting the new cart. As regards the stylus being close to the vinyl, well yes I've already scraped it a few times (horrible noise ) and if the vinyl is slightly warped the stylus can pick up the groove on the higher parts - but theres nothing I can do about it really, I tend to play a side straight through so it's not to much of a worry

Chris - Thanks for the info and the link, a good read on the whole.