Setting anti-skate on your TT is a bit of hit-and-miss affair. There are strong opinions about what is the appropriate anti-skate force to set. When our family got our first turntable (a Sonodyne rig, when I was in school), the manual just told us to dial in the same anti-skate force as the tracking force. So, with that TT, since we were operating with a tracking force of 2.5g, we set anti-skate to “2.5” and forgot about it.
Forty years have passed, and I have a much better turntable, but it does not have any dial with markings for setting anti-skate. My tracking force is 2g with my current cartridge, and my tonearm is a fancy thing (Clearaudio Satisfy Kardan aluminium) which uses the magnetic repulsion between small neodymium magnets to apply anti-skating force. You can turn a bolt to move the neodymium magnet from the frame closer or further away from the tonearm, and this increases or reduces the anti-skating force. Very cool and low-friction, but there is no dial with markings.
So I bought Blank Record Black from Amazon US (USD 25). I don’t know whether any other manufacturer makes such vinyl. This is a calibration record specifically made for setting anti-skating force, without damaging the stylus or cartridge. And as the video shows, I played the vinyl, lowered the stylus on the smooth black surface, and adjusted the anti-skating bolt till the tonearm floated somewhere in the middle of the playing area, neither too close to the outer rim, nor the centre. I also took the adjustment too close to both the edges, and the tonearm indeed slid to the edges of the playing area. So, the tendency to skate is a genuine thing, and anti-skating force is indeed needed, but I don’t know how to set it other than with this beautiful test record.
This is a sunk cost of having a turntable, I guess. I will probably re-check the anti-skating force once a year, and in the meantime, the test record will sit in my rack with my Ortofon and Clearaudio test records.