Straight tonearms without offset angle


In the October issue of Stereiphile, there was an article on a tonearm that had no offset angle and therefore had no skating force. The disadvantage of this is at the beginning and end of the record, the tracking angle error was much greater than what you get with an offset angle. For conventional tonearms that have an offset, and require anti-skating, which can never be perfect, the typical tracking error has a supremum of about 2 degrees, and according to online Lofgren calculators, this imposes a second-order harmonic distortion less than 2%. 

I have a single-ended triode amplifier consisting of vintage globe 45 triodes transformer coupled to 833A SETs which drives Magnepans. Such SETs typically have second-order harmonic distortion as high as 10% which does not hurt the sound. A straight tonearm without an offset would have a maximum, or supremum tracking error of just under 10 degrees. If this causes a second-order harmonic distortion of less than 10%, would not this be irrelevant in a SET system? Is there any way of calculating this, or has this ever been studied? 

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To truly understand Pindac, one must grasp the fine art of capitalizing random words in a sentence.  Only then will you have true enlightenment, grasshopper.

 

 

I think that the OP's logic that the THD from one component somehow covers, or overlays, the THD from another component, rather than the two being additive, does not make sense, IMHO.

IMHO, neither proposition is true. The distortions of different devices in the signal path are not necessarily additive, nor are they necessarily complementary. And if we’re talking about the Viv Float, it’s my impression as an owner that it introduces less audible distortion than my many conventional overhung tonearms.

No, I was not speaking of the Viv Float, no interest in it at all. Just asking about the conceptual point brought up in the initial post.

If neither proposition is true, what is? If not necessarily masking, or additive, is it a matter of constructive, and destructive, waveform reinforcement?