Cartridge setup experts: Azimuth critique

Happy, yes. Plenty good.

Shim kits are a real pain, and you might not improve your nearly perfect angle anyway, and you add something less solid between headshell and cartridge as well as a tiny unsupported gap both side to side and front to back.

Shims SUCK!!!

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I use a mirror the thickness of an LP.

looked at (not magnified) from the front, you see the actual and reflection of the headshell.cartridge body top.sides, straightness of the cantilever. Any error of angle is reflected 'opposite', so it becomes easy to rotate till reflection agrees with reality above. 

This unmagnified method 'assumes' the maker has mounted the diamond on the cantilever. Listening and looking at the diamond magnified can conform that as you have done here.

Seeing a slightly 'bent' cantilever is easy with this method.

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Now, this set of magnified mirrors, picked up, wobbled this way and that beow the stylus let you see the cantilever/diamond and it's cleanliness quite easily

+1 @elliottbnewcombjr I've tried shims in the past and they just made things worse

IF you have a removable headshell, this has two advantages

1. adjustable azimuth

2. no sides, so you have complete access to hold anything below without the sides blocking fingers/tools/vision.

No. The stylus is not perfectly perpendicular to the record. It is slightly tilted to the left side of the photo. 

The more expensive cartridges today from reputable manufacturers are perfectly set. All you need is the Wally Reference Tool and you can set azimuth and VTA perfectly.

IMHO the best protractor is the Smartractor. It is a breeze to use and it gives you the choice of any number of alignments including Loefgren B which I prefer. It is also very useful in tonearm installation. Leave it out and you have a fascinating conversation piece.   

Fozgometer with Ultimate Analog test LP. No guessing