Spin Doctor

Wally Tools WallySkater V2.1 Pro
They say you can't teach an old dog new tricks, and while I learn new things about setting up turntables all the time, I long ago settled into a set of skills I have been using to adjust turntables professionally for decades. What has changed is the tools available to assist that work, which have improved immensely over the decades. I have added many of those tools to my arsenal.

Founded by turntable setup obsessive and inventor Wally Malewicz in 1994, WAM Engineering introduced a range of innovative setup tools that dug deep into setup issues most analog audiophiles didn't even know existed. Wally died in 2018, and for a while it seemed as if WAM Engineering would slip away, but a year later, the company was relaunched by Wally's son Andrzej and WAM's production assistant J.R. Boisclair (footnote 3). In the five years since the revival, Boisclair has done an impressive job of sorting out the company's previously disorganized operations, improving the company's website and owner's manuals, and launching a YouTube channel stocked with excellent tutorial videos. He has also delved deeper into more setup issues and developing new tools to deal with those issues. For example, WAM now offers a personalized cartridge analysis service, with custom fixes for any intrinsic alignment problems the analysis uncovers.

There is no perfect approach to adjusting a tonearm's antiskating. Whatever antiskating force you end up applying will be a compromise. For decades, I have used a method promoted by cartridge rebuilder Peter Ledermann of Soundsmith, which he developed in collaboration with German tonearm designer Frank Schröder. The Ledermann/Schröder approach uses the blank spaces in the lead-out area of a record. Lower the stylus and observe which way the arm moves as it hits smooth vinyl. The goal is to get the stylus to slide slowly inward towards the label rather than having it sit in the same spot, as you occasionally see recommended. I found this to be pretty much impossible to do using the lead-out area of a record, because a short fraction of a second after you drop the stylus, it gets collected by the lead-out groove, ending your observation time.

To solve this problem, I sought out records that were blank on one side, allowing me to observe the arm's behavior for as long as I wanted over the entire side, from the outside edge to the label. The most fruitful source for one-sided records, I've found, is dance music promo singles made for club deejays, where the record companies would have a hot new track pressed on one side of a record, which they could then rush out to the hottest clubs to get their records heard. I found a motherlode of such one-sided pressings at Amoeba Music in Los Angeles, and I now have enough of them to last me a lifetime.

With the stylus on the rotating blank record, you can see clearly how much the arm is being pulled, and in which direction. You can also learn how an arm's antiskating device behaves, such as whether it pulls in for half of the record before quitting, pushes outward from the inner-groove area, or acts erratically.

Enter the WallySkater v2.1 Pro.

In a conversation with J.R. Boisclair, he offered to send me the latest version of the WallySkater to try out. This was a well-timed offer, as I recently have been helping to fine-tune a setup for the owner of an uber-expensive Swedish Analog Technologies CF1-09 tonearm. Each visit requires a 540 mile round trip! Comparing the results from the WallySkater with my old blank record method, I was pleased to find that the two approaches gave identical results. What I didn't expect was how much more I could learn about the arm's behavior with the WallySkater.

The WallySkater is a gangly-looking apparatus made from four pieces of clear acrylic, plus a sliding hanger that holds two colored threads. A tall vertical post fits into a support base that sits on the platter, then two horizontal beams fit into that post, one near the bottom and one near the top, which also holds the hanger with the two threads. The idea is to hang the headshell of the tonearm from one of the threads while the other thread ends with a weight that acts as a plumb bob. Twisting the two knobs on the hanger allows you to fine-tune the length of each thread, which you adjust so the stylus hangs 2 to 3mm above the platter surface, while the plumb bob weight hangs next to a set of graduated tick marks on the lower beam. You observe by how many tick marks the thread supporting the headshell is displaced sideways from the plumb bob thread, which tells you how much outward push is being applied to the arm. Each tick mark equals approximately 1% of the vertical tracking force. The goal is 9%–11%, depending on the length of the arm. What's particularly clever about the design is that a heavier tracking force causes the arm to hang closer to the plumb bob, prompting you to dial in the extra antiskating force required.

While the WallySkater's ability to measure and quantify the antiskate force is impressive, for me its true value lies in two additional tests it lets you perform. The static-friction test lets you see how much "sticktion" your arm's bearings have. By slowly sliding the hanger along the beam, you can observe how far you need to move the hanger before the arm moves to catch up with it. The more friction-free the arm's bearings are, the more closely the arm will follow the plumb bob. Even more useful is the internal horizontal torque force test, which allows you to see whether your arm is naturally pulling inwards or outwards, even when the antiskating device is disengaged. This proved invaluable for dressing the external wire loop on many arms, such as the Kuzma 4Point and VPI unipivots, dressing it to have the least possible influence on the arm. This showed me that with some arms I was compensating for an unmeasured internal arm force using the antiskating. When those internal forces are minimized and so applying only the minimum antiskating needed to oppose the skating force, the arm's behavior becomes more predictable.

In use, the WallySkater is fiddly and at times anxiety inducing, with your precious cartridge's stylus literally hanging by a thread over the platter. The two threads have a tendency to get twisted together, and adjusting the height of arm hanger thread and plumb bob weight as they swing around can be nerve wracking. You can reduce the danger factor by using the WallySkater with your cartridge's stylus guard in place, so long as you set the downforce on the arm with the guard fitted.

I consider the WallySkater v2.1 Pro to be an important addition to my setup toolkit, and while its $310 price tag may sound a bit steep for a tool used to adjust just one key aspect of tonearm setup, the insights it offers are invaluable for fine-tuning any top-class turntable rig.

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Footnote 3: WAM Engineering LLC, Santa Rosa, CA. Tel: (707) 210-6345. Web: wallyanalog.com.