Best protractor for aligning to cantilever

I recently tried buying a Wally tool. Sent him a check in November for a protractor that was in stock. He asks you to call him and remind him to ship a week later. I found that odd but did. After many weeks of calls and emails he finally called to appologize and said he would ship it right out. Three weeks later I still had not received and cancelled my order with 3 months wasted. If you choose to order be prepared for a prolonged hassle.

Harry W told me that the DB protractor is a very good one as well.

If you're using a Grado with a plastic body, I suspect (but I could be wrong) that you'd rather not drop the coin required for a WallyTractor.

Basic cartridge alignment isn't rocket science...it's actually 7th or 8th grade geometry. If you have a spare hour and an installation of Microsoft Excel and Microsoft Visio, it's *very* easy to create and print your own protactor custom made for your tonearm. You'll need John Elison's Excel spreadsheet for the correct measurements.

If you have MS Excel / Visio and are using a Rega (or Rega-based) arm, PM me and I'll send you something ready to print and use. I could even send it to you in .pdf format if you'd like.

If you understand the basics of cartridge setup and alignment, you'll stop worrying about which protractor to use and if your setup is "correct". Until I went through this exercise, I wanted to try every damn protractor out there to verify my setup. Now I understand what is important (hint - it's the process for the setup, not the tool).

As for the question about the VPI setup, John Elison just posted an interesting article about that very subject over at the Vinyl Engine.

The protractor from www.turntablebasics.com is the poor man's version of a Wallytractor. Just $20 and usually instant shipping.

It doesn't have the finely scribed lines of a Wally, but it is built on a mirror, which just as important. No non-mirrored protractor is as accurate as a mirrored one. A mirror lets you use parallax to ensure you're sighting exactly down the intended line. Not possible on a non-mirrored device.

Dougdeacon,

Is there a mirrored protractor for Stevenson geometry? I have a vintage Yamaha YP-D8 table and if I understand correctly Yamaha used Stevenson for their arm/table alignment. I have a turntablebasics mirrored protractor that I used with my old table, but haven't used it since I got the Yammie table. I have Stevenson printed on a sheet of paper, compliments of vinylengine, but find it hard to use, since it lacks rigidity and the mirror surface. Thanks,
Rich