The effect of the cantilever deflection in the reverse is a real thing. I've read about it and observed it. When you get your fluid damping devise (where are you getting it, by the way, so we may obtain our own), you may be able to observe it as well. I am blessed with near sightedness, and if I may pause to brag, I can count the seven strands or litz wire in cardas. To make it easier to observe, I get my mag-light and look head on at the cantilever, observing its revative movement with the cartridge. Then also I sometimes find a spot in the background and observe both the movement of the cartridge and the cantilever as it traverses the record. It is much easier to see with a record that is more off-center than usual, but it is rare that I find a record that I can't observe as being off-center. I have, and do, observe less movement of the cantilever when I damp the arm.
I'm going to jump around- first, yes the last sentence is speculation, I'll explain why later,
I am seeing two separete reasons/uses for damping fluid.
The one reason, is the centering of the cantilever in the coils. The other is the taming of unwanted frequencies.
On the first point on fluid, I am suggesting that the cartridge is a more accurate transducer with its cantilever centered in the coils.
On the second, There is both the issue of the speed at which the cantilever moves (which translates to unwanted bass information, the movement of the cantilever transmitting a bass frequency, which is the 'bell curve' stated above) and the control of the other frequencies higher in the audioband, the resonences.
Now I bounce again. You are correct in your statement of the tonearm being of mass according to the complience, as one reason tonearms are heavier than they used to be, and mass having other purposes. The current thinking in design is to keep the moment of inertia as low as possible in all planes, and at the same time, add as much mass as possible while keeping the moment of inertia low. Tonearm makers are also adding mass at their bases (no doubt allowable by better tables). This can be likened to the effects of a heavy platter being a better sink for resonences, as opposed to just better speed control. Or a heavy suspensionless table as opposed to one that seeks only to isolate.
The other trend, although not new, is the use of new lightweight materiels. The reason for this is not simply to make the arm lighter, but to make the arm stiffer by using more of these stiffer materiels. The stiffer the arm is, the more energy is channeled to these massive energy aborbing bases, and the more solid the headshell is at the cartridge as a result of all this.
Now I bounce back to the meat of our discussion. If we explore the use of damping for the second reasons I stated above, and we explore what is happening at the cantilever as far as movement (I like the bell curve analogy) we may be able to get better results by substituting mass for the reasons we use fluid in that area. The evidence I use to support this is that 1) arms have been getting a lot heavier, and that they seem to be attempting to put it where the moment of inertia would be lowest, 2) The graham arm has its weights slung out at an angle for stability and proper tracking of the cartridge offset angle, and may be enjoying the effects of greater horizontal mass as a side effect, 3) the reputation of linear trackers to have good soundstaging qualities, as they have a disproportionate horizontal mass to their vertical mass, perhaps an overlooked side effect in their quest for accurate transcription.
All of these arms use fluid, however, and in the case on the linear trackers, before it was made available on the E.T., the heavier armtube had a reputation for snapping cantilevers, for the first reason I stated above for the use of fluid. The wheaton also uses fluid, (a real heavywieght), slung out in what seems effective for tracking more than transferring resonences, and of coarse the immedia and graham both depend on it for proper operation.
Further evidence I suggest, and this is perhaps the most compelling, is that the rb-type arms are the lightest in this class, and that they have all benifitted from adding more weight from aftermarket counterweights, And in the deliberate attempt to add weight only in the horizontal plane, seems to have shown results disproportionate to simply adding more weight, and was added in what was stated in the beginning of the thread as perhaps an oversight to why the graham works so well. (the rega does not need counterwights for lateral stability the way the graham does).
I would correlate that fluid on a rega is a rarity and that it is also a lightweight.
So my thoughts now are, do we need to emply fluid on the rega to explore this to a higher limit, and also, if we choose to use more mass, if we would be better off not using fluid for certain applications. There may be trade offs as to how much we allow the cantilever to move in relation to the cartridge, wheather or not the cartridge/arm would work better being in a static position over the record, and reap the benifits of stability, at the expence of letting the cantilever out of center,(or evan if we could get dangerously close to causing damage).
What is particularly fascinating to me is that I have never heard of adding weight for the purpose of modifying the behavior at the cartridge end, but certain evidence shown here seems to support it. That is why, although I believe that to allow the arm to freely with the groove, as opposed to remaining static, is better, I am willing to question it.
I'm going to jump around- first, yes the last sentence is speculation, I'll explain why later,
I am seeing two separete reasons/uses for damping fluid.
The one reason, is the centering of the cantilever in the coils. The other is the taming of unwanted frequencies.
On the first point on fluid, I am suggesting that the cartridge is a more accurate transducer with its cantilever centered in the coils.
On the second, There is both the issue of the speed at which the cantilever moves (which translates to unwanted bass information, the movement of the cantilever transmitting a bass frequency, which is the 'bell curve' stated above) and the control of the other frequencies higher in the audioband, the resonences.
Now I bounce again. You are correct in your statement of the tonearm being of mass according to the complience, as one reason tonearms are heavier than they used to be, and mass having other purposes. The current thinking in design is to keep the moment of inertia as low as possible in all planes, and at the same time, add as much mass as possible while keeping the moment of inertia low. Tonearm makers are also adding mass at their bases (no doubt allowable by better tables). This can be likened to the effects of a heavy platter being a better sink for resonences, as opposed to just better speed control. Or a heavy suspensionless table as opposed to one that seeks only to isolate.
The other trend, although not new, is the use of new lightweight materiels. The reason for this is not simply to make the arm lighter, but to make the arm stiffer by using more of these stiffer materiels. The stiffer the arm is, the more energy is channeled to these massive energy aborbing bases, and the more solid the headshell is at the cartridge as a result of all this.
Now I bounce back to the meat of our discussion. If we explore the use of damping for the second reasons I stated above, and we explore what is happening at the cantilever as far as movement (I like the bell curve analogy) we may be able to get better results by substituting mass for the reasons we use fluid in that area. The evidence I use to support this is that 1) arms have been getting a lot heavier, and that they seem to be attempting to put it where the moment of inertia would be lowest, 2) The graham arm has its weights slung out at an angle for stability and proper tracking of the cartridge offset angle, and may be enjoying the effects of greater horizontal mass as a side effect, 3) the reputation of linear trackers to have good soundstaging qualities, as they have a disproportionate horizontal mass to their vertical mass, perhaps an overlooked side effect in their quest for accurate transcription.
All of these arms use fluid, however, and in the case on the linear trackers, before it was made available on the E.T., the heavier armtube had a reputation for snapping cantilevers, for the first reason I stated above for the use of fluid. The wheaton also uses fluid, (a real heavywieght), slung out in what seems effective for tracking more than transferring resonences, and of coarse the immedia and graham both depend on it for proper operation.
Further evidence I suggest, and this is perhaps the most compelling, is that the rb-type arms are the lightest in this class, and that they have all benifitted from adding more weight from aftermarket counterweights, And in the deliberate attempt to add weight only in the horizontal plane, seems to have shown results disproportionate to simply adding more weight, and was added in what was stated in the beginning of the thread as perhaps an oversight to why the graham works so well. (the rega does not need counterwights for lateral stability the way the graham does).
I would correlate that fluid on a rega is a rarity and that it is also a lightweight.
So my thoughts now are, do we need to emply fluid on the rega to explore this to a higher limit, and also, if we choose to use more mass, if we would be better off not using fluid for certain applications. There may be trade offs as to how much we allow the cantilever to move in relation to the cartridge, wheather or not the cartridge/arm would work better being in a static position over the record, and reap the benifits of stability, at the expence of letting the cantilever out of center,(or evan if we could get dangerously close to causing damage).
What is particularly fascinating to me is that I have never heard of adding weight for the purpose of modifying the behavior at the cartridge end, but certain evidence shown here seems to support it. That is why, although I believe that to allow the arm to freely with the groove, as opposed to remaining static, is better, I am willing to question it.