Expert Junior

[Orchorsol]

The first picture shows where the leather washers are placed. Between the spring. They are also placed on the three backplate screws. Another adjustment is to play with these three back screws, that is slightly adjusting the pressure of the gasket rubbers on the diaphragm leaving a minute gap between the main body and backplate.

Thanks for that, I see them now! Somebody had replaced the back plate washers on mine with rubber instead of leather. Time to fashion some leather washers and start having some fun "tuning"!

Again, thanks!

Sean

Between the back and front plates of the body, rubber seems to be fine (opinion Chunny?) - either a tiny washer cut from old tyre inner tube material, or a thin sliver cut from gasket tubing.

(While on this subject: deep appreciation to Ian Maxted for his kind and highly esteemed input on such matters)

[Lenoirstreetguy]

Those pictures are fascinating. Just for fun here's a expert ad from about 1933. It's taken from Gramophones : Acoustic and Radio published by The Gramophone.

JRT

[FloridaClay]

Just an aside. I am really happy the UK Machines sub-forum has been added, as it is a pleasure to read and learn about machines from across "the pond."

Clay

[OrthoSean]

The first picture shows where the leather washers are placed. Between the spring. They are also placed on the three backplate screws. Another adjustment is to play with these three back screws, that is slightly adjusting the pressure of the gasket rubbers on the diaphragm leaving a minute gap between the main body and backplate.

Thanks for that, I see them now! Somebody had replaced the back plate washers on mine with rubber instead of leather. Time to fashion some leather washers and start having some fun "tuning"!

Again, thanks!

Sean

Between the back and front plates of the body, rubber seems to be fine (opinion Chunny?) - either a tiny washer cut from old tyre inner tube material, or a thin sliver cut from gasket tubing.

(While on this subject: deep appreciation to Ian Maxted for his kind and highly esteemed input on such matters)

The rubber gaskets (from gasket tubing) seem to be just fine. For the leather washers, I'm going to try cutting some Edison belting or maybe a sliver off an old sewing machine belt.

Anyway, thanks yet again!

Sean

[Orchorsol]

The rubber gaskets (from gasket tubing) seem to be just fine. For the leather washers, I'm going to try cutting some Edison belting or maybe a sliver off an old sewing machine belt.

Anyway, thanks yet again!

Sean

The leather washers under the spring screws are extremely thin and soft...

[Orchorsol]

Those pictures are fascinating. Just for fun here's a expert ad from about 1933. It's taken from Gramophones : Acoustic and Radio published by The Gramophone.

JRT

Wonderful old advert, thanks for posting. That's a Senior pictured - arm base in front corner (the Junior's is roughly half way back, and the Minor's is in the rear corner) and 28¼" diameter horn.

[chunnybh]

Between the back and front plates of the body, rubber seems to be fine (opinion Chunny?) - either a tiny washer cut from old tyre inner tube material, or a thin sliver cut from gasket tubing.

Anything of the sort will do. On the back screws, I've used gasket tubing the same thickness as the back plate, that way the screw is not in direct contact with the back plate.
It seems that the idea is to isolate as much as possible, the back plate from the body. (Could be fun trying that out on other soundboxes)
There are 4 springs and the back plate to tweak in this soundbox. I've spent days "tuning" these tweaks and then messed it all up taking the soundbox off the arm, especially now as the back mount is not fixed to the body and moves slightly when twisting the soundbox off. To solve this I have noted the gap and placed washers there so the screws can be fully tightened
Mostly now I tune the soundbox mounted on the arm and then try not to take it off.
And if a soundbox sounds good, even though I think it could do with a re-build, I now leave it alone as different records sound better with different soundboxes.

[Orchorsol]

Reading Kirtley's post on the other thread (EMG enthusiasm) and Valecnik's suggestion of some details and a bit of history - here's a little background for those who are unfamiliar. Hopefully I will be corrected if I'm at all off-beam!

In 1929 E.M. Ginn was more-or-less forced out of EMG, the company he had built up under his own name. His talents were not technical, scientific nor managerial, but he was a huge force in driving and "orchestrating" other brilliant minds to make things happen - and a great salesman. The reasons for the split related to various consequences following an investment loan made to the company, including (apparently/probably) some foolishness on Ginn's part - this is well documented in Frank James's wonderful book, The EMG Story.

In 1930 Ginn set up under the name Expert, in direct competition to EMG (who retained their trading identity, Ginn's initials) despite high-end hand-made gramophones being a small niche market. Various principles relating to the horns and conduits differed from EMG's approach. So started the "horn wars" between the two companies through the early 1930s.

[Orchorsol]

Yes, thanks for the photos! I'm not so well educated on EMGs as I'd like to be. I have the Mark IX, which I'm told is an earlier one that I absolutely love. Just out of curiosity, I measured the bell on my horn and its 23 inches across, I'm not sure why, but I always thought they had smaller horns (and I thought mine WAS smaller than 23 inches!). Mine has an electric Garrard motor which I ended up having completely rewired as the original literally fell apart when I went to take it out. It took me awhile to fins anyone that would even touch it and when I finally did, it cost me all of $40. Now hopefully it's good for the rest of my hopefully many years!

As I've said elsewhere, finding any EMG in the states is pretty much unheard of. This one was found by a fellow TMF member and I was able to convince him to sell it to me and I couldn't be happier. I've spent months "raising" the horn, it had sagged pretty severely over the years and I've managed to raise it about 10 inches so far safely with no cracks or stress, another large relief!

my very machine before I got it:
http://forum.talkingmachine.info/viewto ... 11&t=11762

Sean

I meant to comment more fully on your post and it rather went past me Sean... I love Mk IXs and really hope to find one myself at some point. There's something so pure and "right" about them... apart from the lack of necessary bracing in the horn! Great to hear that you're making good progress with correcting yours.

[kirtley2012]

Reading Kirtley's post on the other thread (EMG enthusiasm) and Valecnik's suggestion of some details and a bit of history - here's a little background for those who are unfamiliar. Hopefully I will be corrected if I'm at all off-beam!

In 1929 E.M. Ginn was more-or-less forced out of EMG, the company he had built up under his own name. His talents were not technical, scientific nor managerial, but he was a huge force in driving and "orchestrating" other brilliant minds to make things happen - and a great salesman. The reasons for the split related to various consequences following an investment loan made to the company, including (apparently/probably) some foolishness on Ginn's part - this is well documented in Frank James's wonderful book, The EMG Story.

In 1930 Ginn set up under the name Expert, in direct competition to EMG (who retained their trading identity, Ginn's initials) despite high-end hand-made gramophones being a small niche market. Various principles relating to the horns and conduits differed from EMG's approach. So started the "horn wars" between the two companies through the early 1930s.

the thing with expert also was that E.M Ginn had already made the best gramophone he saw possible and he had placed pattents on the designes, when he was forced out and created expert he had to re-create everything to avoid running into his own patents, a prime example is the horn with only the single bend as opposed to EMG's horn with 2 bends, and the different tonearms etc