So in the it's never too late or you're never too old to learn something new department ...

I've added one more step to the turntable tuning process for ripping.  Setting the VTA (Vertical Tracking Angle) for a disc while very important has been determined up until now by holding the album and guessing how much it weighs to determine the thickness of the disc itself.  The current rage is 180 gram pressings with some saying that they are 200 grams and they are noticeably thicker besides heavier.

Provided that a turntable has this adjustment, which most do not, the adjustment was usually have the tone arm parallel on the same plane with the disc on the turntable.  Most carts have a tracking angle of either 20 or 23 degrees to get the stylus at the correct angle to the surface for correct playback.  Fine for the old days when the carts were generally less sophisticated and the vinyl was all pretty uniform in weight with the exception of Dynaflex pressings which were deliberately thinner and lighter.  Around 100 grams or less.  Without this adjustment the best you can do is buy different thickness mats to raise and lower the vinyl as needed.

Now with all the new pressings of up to 200 grams the range of thickness has expanded rather dramatically.  Over the years I have found that a change in height as little as 0.25 mm can have a profound difference in sound on some records. You can boost the bass by going lower and improve the clarity of the high end by raising the height as in the case with sibilance and cymbals.  There is an ideal height where you get the proper balance and reach the cart's specified angle. 

My standard range went from 2.40 mm to up to 4.00mm for these newer and heavier pressings with my new cart.  With my previous cart I would sometimes go up to 5.00 mm but it had some hours on it and the suspension was wearing out and it started to sag so I had to increase the height to make up for that sagging.

So the solution is to actually start weighing the vinyl before playing instead of guessing.  I just got a 6 disc box set that had obvious differences in thickness and weight so I figured it was time to try weighing them and see what the difference actually was.  I have a newish scale that I recently found out has a hold function so I can put something bigger than the platform and get a good true weight without doing some acrobatics.  Some were 140 and others were 160 to 170 grams.  Enough of a difference for different settings. 

The result has been better than expected.  By playing one of the box set discs at 4 different heights and playing back the rips I figured out which setting was best for that weight.  Surprisingly, the lower the height the better.  I used to err on the higher side.  Going lower, the sound is markedly fuller on most discs.  Sibilance is pretty much a very uncommon thing now to boot.  Never really had any problems with this cart, but everything is better overall and I'm pretty confident now to use the weight for the setting.

The whole idea of ripping is to capture the best playback possible which requires all kinds of care and adjustments for a specific piece of vinyl and then never have to do it again and listen to the rip instead.  For casually playing vinyl and listening the process is a bit nuts.  Now I just listen to the rip whenever and it is never going to sound better or worse, the record won't suffer from playing anymore and the stylus hours don't get wasted.

This new cart was put into service the last week of July, 2024 and since then I have 1050 album sides or about 350 hours on it.  Calling one album side 20 minutes. Nearly 9 / 40 hour work weeks. The stylus is good for anywhere between 700 and 900 hours.  I have two more factory styli waiting, then it's all over for the cart as there are no more left on the planet for this cart.  I'm way too old to be trying out new carts, and too broke to even think of trying.  They generally are not returnable if you don't like how they sound.

The cart is a 1980 ish AT20SLa, Shibata stylus I bought as a New Old Stock item a few years ago after years of hunting to replace my AT15SS (Super Shibata) carts.  There was one better, the AT20SS, its predecessor.  Unlike most carts, it tests flat from 5hz to 19khz so there is virtually no coloration to the signal. Frequency response is from 5hz to 50khz. They all came with an individualized print out from the test.  Ain't nothing like them has been made since, at least that I know of.  They were originally designed to play Quad vinyl.  Haven't seen any for sale since as I do look a couple of times a year for S& G's.

The turntable is a 1989 Technics SL 1200 MK3 100 volt Japanese model I bought about 10 years ago that I have done some modifications to over time.  It should take me to the end, I hope ...

Weighing the records is the last addition to this process.  No more guessing and stressing about setting the VTA.  I might revisit some earlier rips for comparison but I'm not going to worry too much to start all over again.

william these are wise words

respect 

I predict a cooling off of the political heat, & not just here. Hope I’m right. 

When it comes to US politics I have zero faith in my ability to predict anything at all — but my intuition tells me that more and more of us are beginning to buy into the crazy idea that just because someone belongs to that other tribe doesn’t mean that we can’t still work together on common projects and discuss our many commonly held values and interests. 

Like vinyl :-)

 kurtster wrote:Wow! Interesting. I kind of knew some of that stuff.
But now my head hurts. 

So in the it's never too late or you're never too old to learn something new department ...

Damn. That sounds hard. To say the least. Respect to you for showing up. An awful lot of people don’t… And as for the need to keep a low profile on the RAFT, I understand (& props for an ingenious solution) but I don’t think it’ll be necessary. I predict a cooling off of the political heat, & not just here. Hope I’m right.  When it comes to US politics I have zero faith in my ability to predict anything at all — but my intuition tells me that more and more of us are beginning to buy into the crazy idea that just because someone belongs to that other tribe doesn’t mean that we can’t still work together on common projects and discuss our many commonly held values and interests.  Like vinyl :-)

Yeah, until I got a call from the rehab place where my Mom was just deposited in earlier in the day after being discharged from the hospital.

All hell has broken lose.  She is refusing to comply with anything and refusing her meds. I had to stop in there this morning on my way to work to read her the riot act about doing what she is told to do.  Dementia has become undeniable among other things.  I have a meeting with staff on Monday and have to work on getting to be made her conservator.  Other than that, life is great.

The empty posts ?  I'm going to start logging my vinyl spins in here so as not to piss off certain people.  I can update them here in the empty posts without them showing up in the RAFT since they will just be edited as opposed to new.

Just making adjustments to new realities.

.

Looking at your posts Kurt, it seems like you had a quiet New Years Eve.