That was a BRAND NEW cutting stylus!!!

[EmAtChapterV]

I could scream and throw things right now. I was cutting on a blank with no guide-pin hole, so I had a little piece of tape from the surface of the record to the center flange to keep the leadscrew turning. I had started a test cut near the inner diameter, and suddenly this tape curled up and snagged the back of the cutterhead, lifting it. BANG. One brand-new stylus with a grand total of two sides on it, maybe 12 or 14 minutes of use total, bounced through the lacquer to the aluminum seven times before I caught it. Ruined.

Add to that two consecutive batches of terrible resin trying to cast and replicate a small run of records - smooth as glass for 45 minutes, then suddenly bubbles erupting out of nowhere and semi-liquid, goopy melt-in-your-hand "pressings"... I'm having a terrible month trying to make this work. Now I remember why I put the system in mothballs in February, and before that in 2005.

[EmAtChapterV]

Another "get my brown pants" moment this afternoon, setting levels with a reference tone. Suddenly, Holy Massive Third Harmonic Distortion, Batman! What happened - did the armature go out of alignment, or worse yet, did I blow the coil? I can hear the distortion coming out of the head; it decreases a little when I touch the stylus, yet the set-screw is tight. What on earth is going on?

Since the suction tube on my lathe is strapped to the depth spring arm, I have it set to a minimum depth and then stack coins on the head before a cut if I need it deeper. And it turns out the particular loonie that was stacked on there today has, through the accumulation of the precise amount of handling gunk between 1989 and 2013, developed a resonant frequency of exactly 1000 hertz. Buzzzzzz... Now I feel silly.