JVC L-A55 tonearm resistance issue

[Pioneerlyfe]

I've got a JVC L-A55 table in the shop right now, and this thing has me stumped. When I first began messing with this table there was so much resistance in the first quarter of the tonearm's arc, that it wouldn't move at all under normal operation.
I've re-lubed the auto return mechanism, but that didn't seem to improve a whole lot. After the lube job it would only operate normally with the anti-skate set to zero, and now, three records later, it's acting up again.
Any suggestions would be helpful, as I've been at this for two days without a solution.

 

[Binkman]

G'day Welcome to A.k. Others will chime in soon.
manuals here:: https://www.vinylengine.com/library/jvc/l-a55.shtml

 

[Pioneerlyfe]

G'day Welcome to A.k. Others will chime in soon.
manuals here:: https://www.vinylengine.com/library/jvc/l-a55.shtml

Thank you much

 

[Binkman]

Having any luck with SM ?

 

[Pioneerlyfe]

Having any luck with SM ?

Nope. Jury is still out on this thing.

 

[Binkman]

I did a forum search (top right page search box) and dug up the following thread. there's a bit of chat morphing, skip that, but does reflect your tone arm resistance issue and the solution lies within the mechanism. whatever you do don't remove the mentioned "clip" from the noted arm.
Perhaps @Montycat will chime in.
https://audiokarma.org/forums/index.php?threads/jvc-ql-a5-tonearm-sticks-at-beginning.591532/page-2