2. analog
  3. 128320-1110

Ancient AR Turntable with NO anti skate

A friend had me over to listen to his restored late 60's Acoustic Research turntable.  While listening, I noticed that the somewhat awkward looking tonearm had no anti skate.  Looking closely at the stylus assembly, it wasn't drifting or pulling toward the center spindle.  It seemed to track clean and true through the entire LP.  The arm is the original stock AR arm and couldn't be more that 8.5" or 9" in length.  I am just curious how AR pulls that off with such a short arm?  I have seen several 12" arms (Audio Technica for example) that dispense with anti skate completely but never a smaller one.  By the way, the table sounded wonderful and the cartridge was a Denon 103R.

Thanks,

Norman

 
normansizemore
normansizemore OP
473 posts
 
Randy,

Yes, that's the arm. The sound was really clean. I'm wondering if I can try that with a couple of my tonearms?

Thanks. 
Norman
randy-11
1,913 posts
 
sure, you can try but be careful 

use the adj. anti-skate if you have it
normansizemore OP
473 posts
 
I have a Grace 747 on my Dual 1229 and a SME 3009 on the Garrard 301.  It doesn't work.  I played with them both all night.  I will say though, to my surprise that leaving the antiskate off sounds really good.  I can see however that the stylus is gravitating to the center spindle and that can't be good for the cartridge assembly.
I also tried it using the same cartridge and still wasn't able to get it to track like the AR.

I have always used antiskate but I can now see an argument for leaving it off.

N.


totem395
196 posts
 
If by "Ancient" you mean as late as the mid 50's most every arm had no
anti-skate, including Ortofon's and the first SME series 1 3012,
and 3009's. Although was later available as an option [series 1] 



normansizemore OP
473 posts
 
totem395,

I am really intrigued by this.  I have been looking for documentation on how they addressed the skating issue back then.  I have a SME 3009 Improved, of course with the anti skate.  I am guessing that no one was really concerned about it then? 

Wondering now how many run their turntables without anti skate dialed in?
N
More to discover