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You're very welcome.

George P.

jboger, I was following this thread, and your tall case Standard A, looks exactly like my Royal that I started another thread about it. The only difference is you have the Standard A decal, and mine has the metal anodized plate in the front. Does your Standard have the late pillar and plate motor, like my Royal? If my Royal is originally set up to play Standard records, I wonder if the Royal was a subsidiary of the Standard. It sure would be interesting to know.
Harvey Kravitz

Harvey: Yes, my late Standard has the pillar and plate motor. I will get around to photographing each motor and post the pics. Also I will give case dimensions.

Added some time later: Your Royal looks just like my late model Standard. I see that the nickel plating is peeling same as I mine. As I noted somewhere else, I don't think Columbia prepped the surface of the the aluminum in order for the plating to take.

I believe your Royal was set up to play Standard records with the large spindle hole. The spindles on Columbia machines that are used to play regular records have a small part of the spindle stick up above the tapered brass cone used to support the platter. The fact that your machine does not have that means it took a platter that had the record spindle cast into the platter.

Now have pictures of the late model Standard Model A motor. Here we have a pillar and plate construction that makes up a box in which the parts are fitted. It is very easy to disassemble, clean, and put back together. The motor of course is upside down with the spindle pointing downward.

Here are some shots of the motor used in earliest of the three Standard Model As. This motor I believe is the most common Columbia motor used in its disk machines. The pillar and plate motor, which you can see in an earlier post, strikes me as similar to the Thoren motors. The most obvious difference between the two Columbia motors is the pillar plate motor no longer has the beveled wheels.

And now pictures of the intermediate model Standard A. Several things are worth noting. As Harvey had pointed out in a different post, this model has a bay that can handle up to three mainsprings. Like the earliest model, the frame is still cast iron, unlike the late model which has rolled steel plates. I'm not sure of the manufacturing technique used in the late model, but the plates are not cast iron. Perhaps someone can comment.

If we define the direction of the mainspring arbor as the principle axis, then the arrangement of the wheels, pinions, and governor are off-axis for this intermediate model. This is to accommodate the expandable mainspring bay. That is, the wheels and governor are off to the side although co-parallel with the mainspring barrel. This seems to me a major design difference from the earliest model which has the mainspring barrel at one end, then the wheels and pinions, followed by the governor, all more or less in a straight line. I'm not precise here--I'm ignoring the bevelled wheels--but I think you can get the idea.

So, to repeat, the earliest Columbia Model A motor has the arrangement of mainspring arbor, wheels and pinions, as well as the governor more or less in a straight line. It seems to me this is a characteristic of all the early Columbia motors, especially those for the cylinder machines. Given the length and placement of the mandrel, it would be an obvious arrangement to line the various components of the motor up in a row: start with the mainspring at one end and put the governor at the other. This parallels the mandrel.

Perhaps we can discern the evolution of the Columbia motor. First came the cylinder machines with their linear motors.. Columbia abandoned them and then focused on disk machines. Rather than completely redesign the motor, Columbia kept the same basic layout. Eventually even this was abandoned in favor of the pillar and plate model, a simple but robust engine.

In my next and last post, I will post some pics of the decals and give case dimensions. Then I'm done.

I have a standard a that is different than all three of yours. Mine has a flat crank that's located towards the back of the case. Also, mine has a simple start/stop lever on the motor board with a separate speed control on the bottom. I'll upload some pictures later.

Stephen

Stephen:

Very much want to see pics of your Standard Model A, especially the decal. What address is printed on the decal?