VPI Memorial Owners manual

BEFORE YOU BEGIN

NOT FOLLOWING THIS MANUAL WILL VOID YOUR WARRANTEE.

FAILURE TO SEND IN THE WARRANTEE CARD WILL VOID YOUR WARRANTEE.

• Be very careful when handling the tone arm. The internal arm wire is exposed at the
headshell and at the rear of the arm. This wire is very delicate and contains 64
strands of very pure copper. Physical damage to the wire is not covered by the
warranty after the arm is removed from its box.

• Please do not touch the unipivot bearing parts. Finger oils on the bearing cup in the
upper bearing housing or on the lower pivot point in the arm base assembly can
cause blemishing of the bearing and possible corrosion. Also, the point is sharp, be
careful.

• There are a number of setscrews on the JMW Memorial Tone Arm. The Allen
wrench that comes with your arm will only fit the setscrews that you will need to
adjust. All other screws are factory set and should not be adjusted, except by our
trained technicians. Resetting any of the factory settings is not covered by the
warranty.

DO NOT PUT THE DAMPING FLUID IN THE ARM UNTIL YOU

ARE FINISHED WITH ALL THE ADJUSTMENTS

UNPACKING YOUR JMW MEMORIAL TONE ARM

• This instruction manual was lying on a large foam pad. Remove the pad and put it
nearby on your work surface.

• You will now see a number of things in plastic bags:

• A bottle of arm damping fluid

• Allen wrenches

• Hex nuts, and washers (for cartridge mounting)

• Arm mounting and alignment tool

• “Q” tip

• Shure stylus gauge

• Take all these items out and set them aside. Be careful with the damping fluid. It

should be kept sealed until it is used.

• You will now see a thick foam pad hiding the things you really want to get at. Reach
between the pad and any one side of the box, lift the pad out, and set it aside as
well.

• You can now see the arm tube and counterweight, with its delicate 4-color wire and
Lemo connector, and the arm base assembly. If your arm is pre-mounted on a tone

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arm board, remove the small foam piece covering the "front" of the arm board. Set it
aside with the other packing material.

• Now, here's the hard part. Leave the arm tube and arm base assembly where they
are -- safe in their packaging.

MOUNTING THE JMW MEMORIAL TONE ARM

Below, you will find two separate sets of arm-mounting instructions.

The first set is if your arm's base assembly has come pre-mounted on a tone-arm
board.

The second set covers mounting the arm on your own "blank" tone-arm board.

Procedure for pre-mounted arms:

• Locate the instruction manual for your turntable, follow its instructions, and remove
the existing tone-arm board. If there is an arm on the board first detach the arm
wiring from the arm and turntable ground. Handle everything with extra care and put
board and arm in a safe place.

• Take the JMW’s arm base assembly/arm board carefully from its foam padding and
mount the board (with base assembly) onto your turntable, according to the
turntable's instructions.

• Now that the arm board with the arm base assembly is on the turntable, please go to
page, Final Assembly, and follow the steps there.

Procedure for mounting base assembly on tone arm boards:

• Note: during this procedure you will need a piece of sharpened chalk and a drill
with a 3/16" bit. You may wish to place these items conveniently near by.

• Attach the arm board to your turntable. Place the arm's base assembly on the rear
of the arm board. The connector block must be at the rear of the board.

• Take the Alignment Jig and, with the writing facing up, place its hole over the
turntable's spindle. Align the jig as shown in Fig.1. If the jig does not lie flat or it
does not reach the male bearing well, loosen the screw that is shown in Fig.2 and
move the boomerang shaped part of the arm until the bearing just touches the jig. It
may be difficult moving the boomerang but it is worth the effort for proper alignment.

• Keep the male bearing well in contact with the jig and move the base assembly until
it is in a suitable position on the arm board. See figure 1 for more details.

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• If you wish, the arm tube may be placed in position on the lower bearing to get a
better idea of how the whole arm will look. After the position is decided upon, place
the arm tube back in the box. Be careful not to damage the arm wiring.

• Holding the base assembly firmly in place, take a piece of pointed chalk and trace
the outline of the base onto the arm board. This will allow you to pick up the base
and place it back into position again.

• Pick up the base assembly and turn the arm-height knob counter clockwise until the
lower bearing assembly comes off the base. Be particularly careful as the bearing
assembly reaches its maximum height. Give it support, so that the two guide rods
and the internal screw are not stressed or damaged.

• Place the upper bearing assembly on its side on a cushioned surface. There will be
some lubricant on the internal screw so putting it on its side will prevent any mess.

• Put the base back on the arm board exactly within the chalk outline. Using a sharp
pencil, mark the outline of each of the three mounting holes on the board.

• Set the base aside and remove the arm board from the turntable

• Use a 3/16" bit to drill a hole through the center of each of the three hole outlines.

These three holes need to be perfectly perpendicular to the board's surface. We
strongly recommend using a drill press to achieve this. An alternative is to use one
of the drill guides available for use with a hand electric drill, which keeps the drill
perpendicular to the work surface. Wipe the chalk from the arm board.

• Fasten the base to the arm board with #6-32 X I" Phillips machine screws and
captive lock washer hex nuts. The nut's lock washer must go against the underside
of the board. Make the screws good and tight without stripping the threads. The
side of the base should be parallel to the side of the armboard or the side of the
turntable base.

• If the arm board is too thick for the I" machine screws, you can countersink the nuts
by using a 3/8" forstner drill bit which must be used in a drill press (the lock washer
needs a flat bottom to grab). Otherwise, you can buy longer #6-32 screws at your
local hardware store.

• Refasten the arm board to the turntable following the turntable's instruction manual.

• Carefully place the upper bearing assembly back on the base. Align the guide rods

with their holes and, while supporting the assembly, turn the knob clock-wise to
engage the internal screw. Do not force the screw if it does not engage easily. Back
it off and try again. Lower the bearing assembly to its approximate original position.

• You may have noticed that the screw holes in the arm board are larger than those in
the base. This is to allow for the marks on the board to be slightly off. You will now
compensate for any small difference in the position of the base.

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a. On the platter side of the support platform for the lower bearing, lift

mechanism, and arm rest, is a setscrew. Using the supplied hex
wrench, loosen this setscrew slightly.

b. Once again put the Alignment Jig into position as you did in steps 3

and 4 above.

c. Rotate the support platform as needed to bring the bearing well

securely into the cutout on the Alignment Jig and tighten the
setscrew. Please, just make it tight and don't overdo it. There is a
nylon tip on the set crew and it should not be crushed.

d. Put the jig away for now.

FINAL ASSEMBLY

A. CARTRIDGE MOUNTING:

• Remove the arm tube from the box (taking special care not to strain or damage, the
delicate 4-color wire and Lemo connector) and place it right side up on the foam
pad.

FOR CARTRIDGES WITH THREADED MOUNTING HOLES:

• Use the screws supplied by the cartridge manufacturer to mount the cartridge. Any
other screws may not fit the thread properly and may even damage the threads and
cartridge. USE ONE OF THE SUPPLIED WASHERS UNDER THE SCREW HEAD.

• For all cartridges with pass through mounting holes use the hardware supplied with
the arm. Remember to use the washers under the screw heads to prevent damage
to the finish on the JMW arm.

• In this step, the connectors will be attached to the cartridge's terminals. Disregard
the color of the insulators on the cartridge clips.

THE COLOR CODE OF THE WIRES IS AS FOLLOWS:

RED = right hot WHITE = left hot
GREEN = right ground BLUE = left ground

IF YOUR PHONO SECTION INVERTS PHASE, THE HOT BECOMES

THE GROUND COLOR

• The arm tube should be on its side on the foam pad when doing this.

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• Using tweezers or fine tipped pliers, grip the center of the red wire's connector (do
not grip the wire) and push it onto the cartridge's right hot terminal pin. In the same
way, connect each of the remaining connectors to its respective cartridge terminal.
Do not push the connectors all the way on, as this could damage the cartridge.
Always back up the cartridge with your finger when pushing on the clips.

B. THE COUNTERWEIGHT:

• The JMW tone arm comes with one large counterweight installed on the rear shaft of
the tonearm. For most cartridges you will only need this large weight. The
counterweight is held in position by a setscrew.

• Pick up the arm tube, taking care not to strain or damage the fine 4-color wire and
Lemo connector.

• For now, position the large counterweight as close to the bearing housing as it will
go (toward the front of the arm) but not touching the balance ring. The object here is
to balance the arm while keeping the counterweight as close to the bearing housing
as possible. This results in the least inertia for a given cartridge weight.

• In some rare cases it may be necessary to use two counterweights together.
Contact your dealer if a second counterweight is needed.

C. BALANCING ARM: TRACKING FORCE AND AZIMUTH

• Place the arm tube assembly on the lower bearing, taking care not to strain or
damage the 4-color wire and Lemo connector. Place the arm in its rest.

• At the rear of the arm base assembly is the connector block. Plug the Lemo
connector into its receptacle on top of the block. Notice that the connector can plug
in only one way. Align the red dots on the arms plug with the red dot on the
receptacle. Push gently, do not force the plug.

• Depending on the twist given to the wire when the plug was inserted into the box,
the arm will have a tendency to swing inward or outward when it is in neutral
horizontal balance. Later on, you will adjust the wire's twist to provide slight anti­skating compensation.

• Make sure the turntable is level. Refer to your turntable instructions and use a
bubble level to check level. In most cases, the best place to put the level is on the
platter.

With a unipivot arm it is particularly important to level the turntable. This insures

that the damping fluid will not even come close to overflowing its well.

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