Are the effects of warped records audible?

No, and yes. Few speaker systems can produce much from 10Hz, down. A big Bag End sub perhaps.

But, very deep large excursion / Extremely Low Frequency (ELF) signals from warps can:-

i) cause the resonant system of arm and spring (the cartridge) to become unstable and not play the actual music in the grooves properly, called mistracking.

ii) overload / intermodulate the RIAA and gain stages in a given phono stage.

iii) power amps can be trying to reproduce these ELF signals.

iv) reflex (ported) loudspeakers can run out of excursion while trying to reproduce ELF power below their final slope. Cone bounce?

So, yes of course ELF signals can have audibly deleterious effects on the music, but the ELF won't itself be audible.

Some phono stages have steep High-Pass filters below 20Hz, too few do IMO&E.

Warmest

Tim Bailey

Skeptical Measurer & Audio Scrounger

RE: Are the effects of warped records audible?, posted on May 26, 2016 at 05:14:45

Condorsat
Audiophile

Posts: 1909
Location: NE Ohio
Joined: January 13, 2003

We'll yea sometimes. IMHO ... you notice it most in the break between songs. In my experience it gets lost on continuous music tracks ... unless there are frequent quiet spots.

Headphone listening is where I notice it the most.

If you really want to take note of it ... do a needle drop and analyze the file on Audacity ... amplitude vs time spectrum display.

An easier way would be to leave the dust cover off the TT and listen to the LP surface noise (ignore the musical track) ... with headphones preferably. Watch the tonearm dance and associate the audble surface noise with the tonearm movement.

usually, it may change SRA, posted on May 26, 2016 at 08:25:32
gkirkos Audiophile Posts: 201 Location: Seattle Joined: February 6, 2015	With unipivot tonearms, the VTA going up and down varies the tracking force, which can be audible. In general this varies the SRA as well.

It Depends, posted on May 26, 2016 at 08:54:15

George S. Roland
Audiophile

Posts: 1470
Location: N W Pennsylvania
Joined: March 20, 2004

"Warped records" is a rather vague term. Very few LPs are dead flat coming from the manufacturer. One can use record clamps or turntables that vacuum the LP to the platter to get rid of gentle deviations from flat, but most such mild warps are insignificant sound-wise.

The many turntables I have owned were able to ride over mild bumps without sonic degradation. In worse cases a distortion in sound would be audible but the turntable could still play the record. In the worst cases, the stylus would leave the groove, tossed out by an untrackable warp.

Once my good wife mistakenly set an LP on top of the vents of a tube amplifier, producing a very tight pinch warp in a treasured LP. This steep, sharp warp rendered the LP unplayable. I tried a scheme I had seen in an article Hi Fidelity magazine to place the LP between sheets of thick float glass in a warm oven to flatten it. I tried this numerous times, and the record did flatten out considerably, but never enough to make it playable. Thirty years later, I found a pristine copy of that very LP at Jerry's Records in Pittsburgh for $.50. Delight ensued!

Enjoy your music!

George

I've heard it cause a thump when the stylus passed over the warp. nt, posted on May 26, 2016 at 09:32:11
oldmkvi Audiophile Posts: 10581 Joined: April 12, 2002	/

Depends how big the warp is, And if it is a fast rise, or a 'half the LP rise and fall, posted on May 26, 2016 at 11:19:59

Smelly_Socks

So if you have a warp which is basically one half the LP and it is a shallow even rise and fall, No you will not really hear ir. But a narrow one which challenges the cartridge suspension.. Yeah, it can be heard through the speakers.

Thing is, warped records seem really rare now days. I have NO warped records, and over 90% of my LPs I bought used.
Well, maybe a few with really small warps. Less than 1/8" rise and fall.. But that is also rare enough I never seem to see it.

RE: Are the effects of warped records audible?, posted on May 26, 2016 at 12:34:15
BCR Audiophile Posts: 2444 Location: connecticut Joined: April 7, 2009	If the arm and cartridge are properly matched you shouldn't hear anything. Years ago I had a mismatch and ended up blowing woofers. A good test record that has a resonance track is a must!

I have a record with a . . . , posted on May 29, 2016 at 14:01:13
risabet Audiophile Posts: 3197 Location: SoCal Joined: January 10, 2005	pinch warp, imagine pinching the edge of a unbaked pie crust, that causes a low frequency shuffling sound, subsonic I assume, that also causes the bass driver to visibly "flop" for lack of a better word. Smoother warps seem to cause no deleterious effects to the sound. Science is the great antidote to the poison of enthusiasm and superstition. Adam Smith

RE: Are the effects of warped records audible?, posted on May 30, 2016 at 09:49:54

cactuscowboy@bresnan.net
Audiophile

Posts: 7738
Location: Powell, Wyoming
Joined: July 23, 2007

QUOTE: "What do you hear?

And can you list specific recording(s) that allowed you to hear the effects of warping records?"

Yes and no. Most "warped" records that I own are very shallow and broad warps with no audible effect. Bad edge warps caused by heat damage are another story. Those often have audible effects, a whooshing sound from melted grooves or a thumping sound as the stylus mis-tracks while riding the warp. Or, worse yet, the stylus is thrown out of the groove.

Your second question does not make sense? I could tell you I have a specific recording (Rolling Stones "Out Of Our Heads")with a bad edge warp causing audible effect, but that's a heat damaged record, not a flaw common to all copies of this recording.

RE: Are the effects of warped records audible?, posted on May 31, 2016 at 07:57:21

Victor7
Audiophile

Posts: 96
Joined: September 23, 2015

Timbo, good analysis.
You could add that large "slow" warps can generate substantial "virtual DC" in the loudspeaker coil.

Also pinchwarps can play havoc with high compliance MM/MIs, producing the effect popularly known as the "Grado Dance".
If the OP hasn't seen or heard this phenomenon before, and if one is foolhardy enough to continue playing, a centre vocalist will appear to split into 2 separate persona (one in the L the other in the R channel).

A peculiar form of phasiness unique to tonearm-cartridge resonance best avoided by visually checking the cart at the moment of touchdown in the run-in groove. If you see the cart vibrating vigorously from side-to-side lift off and quarantine that record until you find a better matched cartridge. ;^)

Vinyl Asylum

Are the effects of warped records audible?

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