Scraping sound

I think the suspension has collapsed.
The arm/stylus is almost invisible when the arm is lowered to the record.

Maxh, as noted above, this happened to my Zephyr. Peter Ledermann told me that it will track well at 1.4g, or even 1.2g, but if that doesn't solve the problem, contact Peter.

Maxh,

The suspension is collapsing under load. That much is clear. The question remains, why?

There are two possibilities:

1. The tonearm may be applying excessive vertical tracking force (VTF). This could cause the collapsing you described. It could also damage the cartridge, so DON'T cue the cartridge down again before checking.

To be safe, rebalance the tonearm to zero downforce (arm floating horizontal, neither rising nor falling. Then adjust the counterweight(s) so that downforce is within the Zephyr's recommended limits.

Use at least two VTF scales, to confirm that your reading is accurate and you don't have a faulty scale.

Now cue the cartridge down onto a record. The cartridge should ride normally. Fine tune VTF by listening to confirm clean tracking and optimum sonics.

2. If the cartridge continues to ride low at a confirmed, correct VTF,then the suspension is worn out or broken. An inspection would be in order.

Will do.
Waiting for a new gauge.
Thanks

All the tone arms that I have had have a means for setting VTF. Eg, one turn of the counterweight screw equals one gram. So why couldn't you set the VTF that way and then use the scale for checking or fine tuning? I don't see the need for two scales really.