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LP spindle hole off center

Hi Everyone,
I was just listening to a new album I bought, "4:13 Dream" by the Cure. I noticed a lot of distortion in the right channel. I looked at the record as it was playing and saw the tonearm swinging inwards and outwards a LOT. I surmise that the spindle hole is off center by a good distance. I would estimate it is off by approximately the radius of the hole itself.
Three questions:

1) Is this the likely cause of the distortion?
2) Why the right channel?
3) Has anyone ever attempted to manually "fix" an off-center spindle hole? Any success?

Cheers.

Tom
tfkaudio
markphd
667 posts
 
It would certainly cause distortion, although I don't know why it would only be one channel.

I have an LP which has a hole that is off by more than the diameter of the hole itself. I just drilled a new hole with a forstner bit. Worked fine.
brf
1,715 posts
 
Use a record that has a perfectly centered hole and use it as a template to drill a new hole.
casey33
260 posts
 
Get rid of the record.Don't buy any others from the same manufacturer.
plato
1,543 posts
 
Off-center records would cause pitch distortion, possibly dectable on sustained tones... but not "distortion in one channel." So you have two problems... a bad record, and some other problem with the turntable setup (maybe improper alignment or anti-skating force). Could even be a worn stylus or bent cantilever. I'd definitely experiment with the anti-skating setting and check the cartridge alignment and tracking force. You can probably eyeball the cantilever to see if it looks centered.

A lot of times I play off-center records and can't even tell except by looking at the arm move. But if it's very severe like you've noted it may be audible. Do you notice distortion on loud passages on other records?
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