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Graham Phantom Anti-Skate. Is it effective at all?

I've had my Phantom Supreme over a year now, and for the most part it's been a pleasure. Beautiful build & sound; awesome VTA and azimuth adjustments. My main hangup had been the headshell; getting a Koetsu to sit flat on the 10" wand seemed impossible because the correct overhang pushed it all the way to the back, behind the main headshell points of contact. Finally I just used 2 plastic washers as shims to get a nice flat mount.

Now my main concern is the anti-skate. I'm not sure if all Phantoms are this way or if it's an issue with my unit. I can't seem to get an effective amount of anti-skate. My preferred method for adjusting anti-skate is to drop the needle in some dead-wax before the label (NOT into a lead-out groove) and adjust so that the stylus creeps *slowly* inwards. With my Graham, I cannot achieve that...it always moves quickly inwards no matter how far out I set the weight. Even physically pushing down on the weight doesn't seem to have much effect in swinging the arm. To me, this seems like the mechanism is not effective, as if I'm running without any compensation. This is very unlike my experiences with a Fidelity Research FR64fx (weight and fishing line) and Clearaudio Magnify (magnetic) -- both have a very noticeably effective anti-skate mechanism, which I can easily dial-in as described above. In fact I just setup a Magnify...it was great!

On my Graham, the pulley & rope system seems to be correctly in place. But without a 2nd until to examine, I can't determine whether this is normal. Could other owners/users of Graham please comment on their experiences with its anti-skate? The situation is OK for now -- I burn hours on my good cartridges very slowly and sparingly -- but I'd rather not have my nice cartridge seeing asymmetric wear over the long-run.

-- Mike
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downunder
1,329 posts
 
I believe he fundamental difference between the Mint lp and the Graham jig is the alignment curves are different.
The Graham is his own and does not conform to the standard B,S or L alignments.

much like the VPI jig, the designer knows what they are doing the their jigs sound better imo.
dougdeacon
3,338 posts
 
As Downunder points out, comparing a standard Mint protractor (Baerwald) with the Graham jig (non-Baerwald) is comparing apples with oranges. Any sonic differences cannot reasonably be ascribed to the device, per se, but will rather result from the differing null points and the resulting tracking angle error differential at every point along the stylus arc.

That said, the Mint is several orders of magnitude more precise than the supplied jig. If one had both, in versions designed for the *same* alignment scheme, one's results with the Mint would necessarily be more accurate and repeatable.

Yip would make a Mint protractor for Graham's preferred alignment scheme (whatever it may be). One need only email him the tonearm mounting distance, effective length (or overhang) and the offset angle. The protractor's arc and the intended null points can be calculated from there.
rockitman's avatar
rockitman
417 posts
 
Doug, the pivot to spindle distance is the difficult part to get right if you use a mint. Yip's distance is different from what Graham does with his spindle cup and empty arm wand. Like I said, for Graham arms, my experience has been better with the Graham jig vs. Mint. YMMV.
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unoear
141 posts
 
Rockitman, thanks for the super advice regarding the Graham. I had a similar situation aligning the Graham arm. In my case, I was using the Bavarian Uni-Protractor...the Graham jig was superior; IMHO, it was something to with the other's PTS quantitative scale, the Graham jig was spot-on.

Cheers!
moonglum
619 posts
 
A while back I seem to remember someone mentioning that Bob favoured the Stevenson. There are a lot of misconceptions surrounding the Graham jig. For example there is a popular belief that the graticule window weight corresponds to average downforce e.g. 1.8g. If this were true Bob would be inundated with complaints from those whose carts require lighter forces. Effectively it would destroy the suspensions on some of those carts, long term.

The reality is that the window only weighs approx. 0.5g (as stated by Graham distributor). The disadvantage of this is that it will necessarily incur a smaller deflection of the cantilever (less compression of the suspension than normal). This would cause an error but...as if in a self-compensatory manner, the angle of the window is never horizontal and will tend to offset this error.
Before users begin to "freak out" the size of the resultant error is probably less than 1/3rd the diam of a human hair i.e. not the sort of thing that even the steadiest hand will rectify without making it worse (this assuming the cart dimensions are even as claimed!). Also, the jig itself has tolerances otherwise it would seize :) These tolerances may also work towards reducing this error rather than making it worse(?)

Typically, headshells that use the 3-point mounting system will be worse than this and won't have the capacity to offset angle for badly oriented cantilevers - they have to accept the cartridge condition, warts and all...
There are a lot of unknowns here so the best advice is to do your best with the alignment and be happy. :)

I genuinely hope this helps rather than upsets :)
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