VPI 2nd Pivot for 3D

Well so much for the Rock 7 Townshend TT and/or trough damping system. Check their website they don’t list TT’s as a product they make anymore. I contacted the U.S. distributor, here is his reply:

Can the Townshend damping system trough be bought separately?

Sorry, no.

Reviews on the Rock 7 seem to imply it. My thought, to mount one to a stock new VPI Prime using the unipivot 3D arm, possible? Could you give me a ball park price?

I had considered the Rock 7. This article scarred me off of the Rock 7: https://positive-feedback.com/Issue62/townshend.htm

Not sure why. It was an excellent review. (The reviewer still owns a Rock 7, by the way.)

and got me thinking of the above fix to the Prime. I copied the paragraph below which steered me away from the TT. Key was the added expense of a DC motor/power supply rather then the expense of just throwing $$ at cords, which I feel would be my scenario also. The reviewer highly suggests that the Rock 7 needs to be setup with help from a dealer versed in the matter below. My big problem is living in an isolated area at high elevation in NW Montana with a dealer probably close to 1000 miles away- not going to happen. Hey, I got electricity. Anyhow, hard to imagine such a messed-up setup and easiest get around cost $1900.00- Any comments on this ??

Okay, now I get it. I don’t see the power cord issue as insurmountable. Nevertheless, setting up the Rock did (past tense, as it is no longer made), require expertise having nothing to do with power cords. The VPI is a much simpler proposition.
Dan MeinwaldEAR USA

P.S. I also contacted the Townshend home website Contact page. They simply didn't acknowledge my inquiry at all, so I guess they are out of the TT business-

Raul,

The link you provided is for a sales pitch of the Mark Levinson/VPI turntable.  Please send the link again.  Thanks.

Bill

@billstevenson Raul’s point is to look at 12s in where there is a needle drop with an Ortofon cartridge, the arm swings noticeably which Raul maintains shows the inherent instability in Uni-pivot designs (absent a pseudo second pivot like the one under discussion). Funny thing regarding this video is that the ML turntable is actually a gimbal design, the stupid art director for the video dropped in a shot of some other VPI turntable! This was all discussed earlier in the thread (see entries dated 7/26-7/27)

If folkfreak's post above is accurate, it should have been corrected immediately so as to not deceive in any way, future customers! However, it's easy to find videos of the arm swaying side to side until it becomes steady by way of natural causes, which is the entire argument in a nutshell, isn't it? I experience it every time I lower the arm onto a lp.

@billstevenson, My posts regarding the different clamps/weights involved comparing them alone and with my mats and the differences I found. The mat/s won out with no weights/clamps easliy.

Dear @billstevenson : @folkfreak is rigth. The tonearm in that video is a VPI unipivot one.

@slaw  posted """  it's easy to find videos of the arm swaying side to side until it becomes steady by way of natural causes ..."""

as a fact that instability happens in any unipivot tonearm, is inherent in this kind of tonearm bearing design.

In that video we can see the instability at macroscopic level but that instability coninue all over recorded area at microscopic levels.

As folfreak said all those already were under discussion through this thread.

Regards and enjoy the MUSIC NOT DISTORTIONS,
R.