Dover,
Thanks for the alternate view... very useful insights on the competing forces at work here. I'll defer to anyone with a real understanding of physics as to how the forces net out. In anecdotal terms, I've played with zero A/S on my Triplanar for several years. My main cartridge has ~1000 hours of play under that condition and displays no cantilever deflection whatever... FWIW.
In real world use, I believe that A/S devices present a greater risk of causing (inward) cantilever deflections than the risk posed by skating forces to cause (outward) cantilever deflections. This is because the majority of A/S devices and users apply TOO MUCH FORCE.
Unless one does some fairly tedious and involved experiments one may not appreciate just how little A/S force is actually needed to achieve balanced sidewall pressures when playing real music. On my way to playing with zero A/S I experimented for months by reducing A/S to truly tiny amounts, far lower that the original design of my TriPlanar's device would permit. I replaced the metal A/S weight with rubber O-rings, each of which weighed only 1/23rd as much, and eventually played without even those, only the empty dogleg itself was applying any force.
To hear the effects of this required playing at the lower limit of VTF needed for clean tracking. That's where my cartridge plays best anyway so I was already tweaking VTF on a daily basis, sometimes by less than .01g. Having found the knife edge of trackability I began reducing A/S while playing difficult-to-track passages (real music, not test records). I was surprised to learn just how little A/S was needed to eliminate R channel breakup. As my cartridge passed 500 hours I found that essentially no A/S was needed, but even when it was the amount applied by the tonearm's supplied weight was vastly too much. I never needed more than 1/4 that much weight, even when the cartridge was new. My conclusion: the majority of users have not taken the time to experiment to this degree and are probably applying too much A/S, particularly as the A/S devices supplied with some tonearms apply too much by design.
As to sonics, I've no experience with VPI arms so won't comment on your impressions, but the sonic improvements from using zero A/S are very clearly heard on my tonearm too. As stated, I believe these improvements result from eliminating the pre-dampening of the cantilever against the suspension. Of course the audibility of this or any tweak will vary with the cartridge, the tonearm and the transparency of the entire system.
Thanks for the alternate view... very useful insights on the competing forces at work here. I'll defer to anyone with a real understanding of physics as to how the forces net out. In anecdotal terms, I've played with zero A/S on my Triplanar for several years. My main cartridge has ~1000 hours of play under that condition and displays no cantilever deflection whatever... FWIW.
In real world use, I believe that A/S devices present a greater risk of causing (inward) cantilever deflections than the risk posed by skating forces to cause (outward) cantilever deflections. This is because the majority of A/S devices and users apply TOO MUCH FORCE.
Unless one does some fairly tedious and involved experiments one may not appreciate just how little A/S force is actually needed to achieve balanced sidewall pressures when playing real music. On my way to playing with zero A/S I experimented for months by reducing A/S to truly tiny amounts, far lower that the original design of my TriPlanar's device would permit. I replaced the metal A/S weight with rubber O-rings, each of which weighed only 1/23rd as much, and eventually played without even those, only the empty dogleg itself was applying any force.
To hear the effects of this required playing at the lower limit of VTF needed for clean tracking. That's where my cartridge plays best anyway so I was already tweaking VTF on a daily basis, sometimes by less than .01g. Having found the knife edge of trackability I began reducing A/S while playing difficult-to-track passages (real music, not test records). I was surprised to learn just how little A/S was needed to eliminate R channel breakup. As my cartridge passed 500 hours I found that essentially no A/S was needed, but even when it was the amount applied by the tonearm's supplied weight was vastly too much. I never needed more than 1/4 that much weight, even when the cartridge was new. My conclusion: the majority of users have not taken the time to experiment to this degree and are probably applying too much A/S, particularly as the A/S devices supplied with some tonearms apply too much by design.
As to sonics, I've no experience with VPI arms so won't comment on your impressions, but the sonic improvements from using zero A/S are very clearly heard on my tonearm too. As stated, I believe these improvements result from eliminating the pre-dampening of the cantilever against the suspension. Of course the audibility of this or any tweak will vary with the cartridge, the tonearm and the transparency of the entire system.
