Upgrade Tonearm for VPI Aries 3

Wlutke,

You are correct with the amount of damping fluid.
Eventually I will put a little more fluid in the arm.

But first I want to get everything as perfect as possible without the fluid.
I'm trying to find the happy medium settings where most records sound acceptable.

Abill,

I understand. You may have guessed that I have recently, over the last year actually, added the XX2 and fought with the set-up of the arm to accommodate it. If you can improve the sound by getting the damping fluid correct then by all means do so first. It will help you determine the changes in sound that experimenting with VTA and VTF bring. Through trial and error and repetition I have learned and here is my advice:
Set the loading at 100 Ohms. I found setting it higher to liven things up but sacrifice the ease of audiophile quality for "wow" first impressions that soon become tiring.
Get the azimuth right.
Set the VTF. Some prefer 1.95, others 2.0 2.0 has more heft.
Re-Align the cart if necessary and recheck everything.
Experiment with raising and lowering the arm height. Reset the VTF when you do. It will change.
The correct range of height will be apparent when lowering the arm makes the bass sound slow and your foot stops tapping. Raising the arm picks up the beat and there will be a small range in that area where the magic happens. Raise it too far and the sound feels emotionally bleached (my test).
And lastly, get a good phono cable. I tried the VPI 2 cable with the Discovery wire and it sucked with a capital "S" compared to what I'm using now. As always YMMV.
Good luck. It all sounds easy until you try it for yourself. Sometimes it's what your listening for and sometimes it's what you "feel" that determines the correct setting.

Bill

Wlutke,

I ordered a Herron line stage and phono stage today, I'll have it in a week can't wait.

Thank you for the set up guide, I really appreciate it.
Do you notice with your xx2 if you have too much VTF and the distortion comes back ?

It takes time to VFT VTA all dialed in but I'm getting there.
I have the Nordost wire in my 10.5i and I'm using the discovery cable.
What are you using ?

Thanks,

Bill

In MY system, the Nordost wire sounds too hifi....the Discovery sounds organic and true.

Abill,

On the VTF - no the extra .05 on the VTF doesn't audibly affect the tracking on my set-up. Within the range of the cart, the consensus seems to be that more VTF actually makes the cart track better. In my experience, mistracking is better cured elsewhere in the set-up process.
My arm has the original factory wiring from the era it was manufactured. It's an original JMW Memorial 10. Nothing special?
Mu vinyl is played by a Dynavector XX2 MKII, VPI HW-19 MKIV with JMW arm, Stand alone motor, VPI digital speed control, Nordost Frey2 phono cable to an ARC PH-7 phono pre, Nordost Frey 2 to an ARF REF-3 pre, Nordost Frey 2 to an Ayre V-5xe, Acoustic Zen Satori Shotgun cables to Vandersteen 3A Sigs.