Has anybody tried the Reed 3P?

Dear Vetterone, You deserve the counterweight which I promised to you under proviso that you should write more about the 3P then 'I have' in your first post. By looking
to your system I noticed that one of your Reeds missed the counterweight. I now don't believe that you need one.
What I need is some help to visualize the bearing 'system' of the Reed 3P. As with Kuzma's '4 point' tonearm the description 'uni-pivot' is ,anyway to me, confusing. I know
that pictures can be more suitable for the purpose then descriptions but I have never seen pictures of either with clear exposure of the bearing(s).

Regards,

Dear Steve and Nikola, Thank you both for describing the 3P. I can't quite visualize the new way of adjusting azimuth, but I take your word(s) that there is no step backward, only forward with the 3P.

Steve, can you elaborate what you mean when you say that the azimuth adjustment on the TP causes "noise"? Since the TP cannot be had without that adjuster, I don't know how you can arrive at a conclusion that it is a culprit in causing noise. (I would think that to do that experiment, you need a TP with no azimuth adjuster, so you can compare the two to be able to blame the azimuth adjuster per se for noise.) I kind of agree that the TP azimuth adjuster has more of a theoretical issue with the way it works vs a real world one, provided the cartridge was reasonably well built and aligned in the first place.

Ldvalve, What I'm talking about is that with the Reed 2A cum azimuth adjuster, you twist only the cartridge mount about its vertical axis. This changes only azimuth. With the TP or any other tonearm that twists the arm tube (I think also the Talea), you are slightly changing VTA as well. Think about it.

Lew, the paragraph in which I used the Tri-Planar reference was talking about noise from anti-skate (AS), not azimuth adjustment. Sorry for the confusion. The noise comes from the pivoted AS lever rubbing against the stationary pin attached to the armwand. On a microscopic level, you may as well be rubbing two files together even if one surface has a plastic tube on it to diminish friction. Having all those cantilevered units hanging out vibrating like a tuning fork does not help either.

Nikola, I wondered how many would catch the missing counter weight. You are one of the few. I did have a counterweight "walk away" at CES one year so I do need one...

Trying to explain the bearing system with words only for the 3P is not easy. It certainly is not a true uni-pivot although the horizontal movement is in fact controlled that way. The top horizontal control bearing carries a secondary frame that also houses the two side bearing cups. The two side bearings are mounted directly to the armwand. The side bearings control only the vertical movement. The top bearing cup is mounted such that a cam action can be activated by the small lever located in front of the top bearing. This azimuth adjusting lever will rotate the position of the top bearing side to side and in turn, will rotate the secondary frame. That action will adjust azimuth. Remember, the top bearing carries the entire armwand/secondary frame weight and that assembly is ultimately controlled by the single top bearing. Does this make any sense? I could never be an instructor. It might help when looking at the 3P pictures if you knew the side bearings were pointing down, not sideways as the 2A.
Hope this helps.

Dear Vetterone, The Reed importer without weight? I am not
sure about America but in Europe there also, uh, a figurative meaning of 'weight': not much of an importer. Besides a 'strange one' testing visual capabilities of his
forum (co) members with his system. I thought that the meaning
of the 'system' is to show off with our toys? If you are not joking and if you are capable to reach me via the new Agon site I will first post the pictures to you of both of my spare counter weights with description of their own weight so you can choose one of them. I wrote about 63 e-mails to Vidmantas begging for extra weights so he had actually only two choices: the asylum in his neighbourhood or posting the extra weight to me. As a very smart person he posted to me two of them with the hope to prevent more e-mails from me. Ie the persistance is an important characteristic of an real audio enthusiastic. This of course imply the 'symetrical' character of the producer.
BTw otherwise than Lew I got the anti-skate 'theory' of yours straightaway right and was amused with Lew's confusion reg. azimuth versus anti-skate. I always thought that he
is a kind of expert in (a.o.) analog matters.
However I am very fond about my Triplanar so not willing to
accept your theory about the anti-skate in general and certainly not in particular reg. my Triplanar anti-skate provision. Besides we already have had an extensive discussion about the Triplanar by which (nota bene) I followed Lew's advice and ordered by my machinist 3 extra anti-skate weights in diminishing ordering qua weight.
BTW I am not sure about your quality as importer but there is
nothing wrong with your writing capability. So I will pretend to have grasped the bearing system of the 3 P as described by you.

Regards,

Yes, Steve's tome started out talking about azimuth, so when he got to talking about anti-skate (abbreviated "AS") I did not originally pick up on the change of subject. Mea culpa. Doug Deacon has also been a critic of the AS device on the TP, but Doug was talking about "resonance" (his word). Perhaps he really was alluding to the same phenomenon that concerned Steve. Since Steve's explanation makes more sense to me (anyway), I will take another look at the AS device to see what can be done about it, if anything. I am not sure that the tiny O-ring solution to excessive application of AS with the TP standard AS weight really does anything about the "noise" issue.

Nikola, I don't claim to be an expert on anything, except I always aspire to be an expert on the elements of my own audio system. It's an endless process, and one is never really "arrived", even in that microcosm. But I do know the difference between anti-skate and azimuth.