Pathé adapter for Victor phonograph

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emgcr
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Re: Pathé adapter for Victor phonograph

Post by emgcr »

brianu wrote: I never realized that using these would result in extra record wear. is that really true?
Given that accurate tracking is a pretty precise mathematical/geometric calculation, it is likely that such an alteration would produce very harmful results as well as loss of volume/sound quality. Increased record wear would be a certainty by definition unless, by chance, the original tracking was so far out that the addition of this item corrected the error---extremely unlikely !

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Marco Gilardetti
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Re: Pathé adapter for Victor phonograph

Post by Marco Gilardetti »

brianu wrote:definitely. and that's similar to another such adapter - recently available on ebay and, from a different seller, in the trader section here - except that one had a fixed saphire needle and no thumbscrew. I never realized that using these would result in extra record wear. is that really true?
Image

Brian, I failed to understand if you actually purchased the item in the end. If positive, I'm curious: does it really work, at least to some degree? And how would you comment the sound quality?

Concerning your question: yes, definitely. Even if you put attention and mount these gizmos with *some* respect to the tracking angle and offset, they will be very very heavy on the hinges of the needlebar. They will preminently vibrate in a direction that is 90 degrees out of the intended one: vertical instead of lateral. The hinges of a lateral-cut soundbox are almost totally locked in respect to vertical oscillations, so the sapphire ball would act very hardly on the record's surface. That would wear out the grooves very rapidly, in my opinion.

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OrthoSean
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Re: Pathé adapter for Victor phonograph

Post by OrthoSean »

I've got a Hughestylus at home and use it on occasion, I've never noticed an issue with it causing any kind of wear on Pathé or any other sapphire type vertical cut discs and that's something I pay close attention to. Like any other sapphire stylus designed to play these discs, if there's already visual groove wear, I do notice the wear will increase almost immediately. These tend to be available at phono shows often still sealed for $50-60. Mine was $50 some time back and the same dealer I bought mine from, who's name escapes me, still had some sealed at the last show although the price may have gone up slightly from the $50. If nothing else, they are a neat display item.

The eBay item is a completely different story, I don't think I'd want to use that at all...

Sean

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emgcr
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Re: Pathé adapter for Victor phonograph

Post by emgcr »

OrthoSean wrote:....I've never noticed an issue with it causing any kind of wear on Pathé or any other sapphire type vertical cut discs....
Sean
Yes, this is probably the only time it is possible to get away with incorrect tracking as the spherical sapphire does offer some compliance. The gem face presented to the groove is constantly changing over the course of the disc but, so long as the sapphire is perfectly spherical, minimal wear may result.

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Re: Pathé adapter for Victor phonograph

Post by Marco Gilardetti »

I can very hardly figure that a soundbox so heavily altered in geometry, mechanics and offset may offer a correct compliance and good tracking. I can understand that the wear may not be immediately evident at visual inspection, but still I would use this converter very very cautiously and very sparsely.

I am still thinking to how this thing may work. The best I can figure is that, being the arm of the Hustylus bonded at the soundbox' needlebar, while the groove oscillates vertically (hill & dale...) the sapphire tip can move basically over an arc of circumference, of which the needlebar will be the center as in top half of the attached figure.

The motion over the arc can be decomposed on a vertical and a horizontal component, as in bottom half of the attached picture. It will be then evident that a portion of the vertical movement of the groove has been partly transformed in a horizontal movement which is transferred to the needlebar (fat red horizontal arrow) and there converted into sound. The vertical component will go in wear and heat.

Should this be confirmed to be the actual principle, I expect the sound to be very thin in volume, as even graphically it is quite evident that most of the energy is wasted in a vertical movement that will be dissipated and not detected by the soundbox.
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Hustylus: "horizontal" principle and decomposition of forces.
Hustylus: "horizontal" principle and decomposition of forces.
Hustylus_principle.jpg (78 KiB) Viewed 2277 times
Last edited by Marco Gilardetti on Thu Mar 26, 2015 4:15 am, edited 1 time in total.

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OrthoSean
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Re: Pathé adapter for Victor phonograph

Post by OrthoSean »

Actually, the sound from a Hughstylus is very good, not thin at all. I've had and used mine on and off for well over 10 years. One of my "go-to" demo discs for this is a very strident ragtime banjo Pathé disc. It remains in excellent condition with no wear having been played likely 50 or more times with this assembly. As I noted above, a disc with worn grooves already will wear more. Now that I own a Pathéphone model 2, I play my verticals on that machine and The Hughestylus has been relegated to display inside a machine along with several other curious vertical attachments.

Sean

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Re: Pathé adapter for Victor phonograph

Post by Marco Gilardetti »

Well, so that's probably not how it works. There must be some other effect that I can't think of.

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Re: Pathé adapter for Victor phonograph

Post by Marco Gilardetti »

There is another principle that might do the task. It is more evident and easier to grasp if the needle and soundbox are imagined rotated so that the needle will point almost vertically down to the surface of the record, and not reclined 45 degrees as usual.

A "hill" of the groove will force the entire Hustylus and needlebar assembly to pivot around the hinge of the needlebar thus actuating the diaphragm, as in drawing.

We can refer to the previously proposed principle as the "horizontal" principle and to this one as the "vertical" principle. When the soundbox is in the usual working position (that is reclined 45 degrees clockwise) both the horizontal and vertical principles will be active and will partially transform the vertical cut of the record in a horizontal movement of the needlebar that will be detected by the diaphragm. However, the vertical principle seems to be (and probably is) way more efficient and will provide much more sound than the horizontal one.

This might be easily proven by temporarily rotating the soundbox counterclockwise so that the needlebar + Hustylus assembly will act almost vertically on the record's surface. The volume should increase sensibly, as the more efficient vertical principle will be enhanced at the expense of the less efficient horizontal principle. (Overhang will be reduced by doing so. However the sapphire tip is a sphere and will thus pass over the grooves in the usual way: it will not dig the groove as a metal needle would.)

Should it be possible (but it isn't) to recline the soundbox 90 degrees clockwise so that the needle will act almost horizontally on the record's surface, only the horizontal principle will be effective and the sound should then be very thin but still audible, as both principles are to some degree able to convert the hill & dale movement of the groove in a horizontal movement of the diaphragm.
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Hustylus: "vertical" principle.
Hustylus: "vertical" principle.
rsz_26031500.jpg (115.55 KiB) Viewed 2236 times

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Re: Pathé adapter for Victor phonograph

Post by Edisone »

The same idea was used in Theodore Edison's pickup for the electrical Edison phono; leaving out the steel needle allowed the diamond to touch a record :
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EdisonPickup.jpg

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Re: Pathé adapter for Victor phonograph

Post by Marco Gilardetti »

There's an auction for a Hustylus currently on PayBay, and the classified is interseting as it also displays some pictures of the accompanying leaflet. This page is particularly intereseing as it covers the physics on which the Hustylus is based, and it also points out that, in order to achieve the loudest sound, the needlebar should ideally be placed vertically.
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s-l1600.jpg

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