Wear was a known entity. It was expected. My mom wore out a record of 'String of Pearls" because she played it every day when she got home from high school as a young teen. She wore it out, not damaged it out. Damage is a scratch, a crack, a chip or a needle dig. Every time you start and run your car you are wearing components. Are you damaging the car? No. If you hit a tree, then you are damaging the car. It has nothing to do with wear of components. If you don't change the oil in the engine, wear will be accelerated. I don't think it is right to call planned for/expected change-with-use "damage". Ron L -----Original Message----- From: phono-l-bounces at oldcrank.org [mailto:phono-l-bounces at oldcrank.org] On Behalf Of Rich Sent: Thursday, March 06, 2008 10:45 AM To: Antique Phonograph List Subject: Re: [Phono-L] Shellac records and damage from steel needles It turns out the the DD does experience wear or damage, pick the one you like. And when does wear become damage? A properly setup and maintained linear tracking arm with a modern low mass high compliance cartridge will cause minimum damage to the grove walls. If you cling tenaciously to the pivoted tone arm with its changeable geometry and steel needle that needle will wear the grove as it rotates in the grove. You will be shaving rock dust off of the side walls as well as continuously reshaping the needle. Looks like damage to me. Ron L wrote: <SNIP> > I think Greg Boganz mentioned the lack of wear on DDs on the Electrola list > recently. It is not entirely because of the tone arm and has to do with > vertical grooves and the nature of the DD surface. > > Ron L _______________________________________________ Phono-L mailing list http://phono-l.oldcrank.org