Columbia 156a viva tonal gramophone

[phonosandradios]

Tonearm made of pot metal, that was not what we hoped for.
I probably will meet the same problem with the tonearm on my 156A. I will start removing the tonearm tomorrow myself too, to see what is wrong. I would not be surprised if I will see exactly the same as on your machine.

Good luck with yours. I can't do anything with mine because of those cracks and as its pot metal it will just break so I will be on the lookout for a suitable replacement which I can hopefully locate.

As I posted previously if anyone in the UK has a suitable replacement in their parts pile I would be happy to buy if off you. If you have one please send me a PM with a price.

[Inigo]

Maybe a silly question, but have you checked if the turntable is sitting too high above the motorboard?
Another point is that these tonearms are supported on a ball bearing, formed onto the tonearm ring and the Base, and I've found sometimes issues with this. If there's too much wear on the ball races the tonearm wouldn't sit properly no more, and what is worst, if it had been mistreated or kicked at some position, the hard steel balls leave marks on the soft bronze ball races, resulting in a quirky tonearm movement across the records as the balls pass over these marks. There's not an easy repair for that problem, the ball races and end rings having to be reshaped and readjusted on a machine, and the balls substituted by new ones of slightly larger size. The best is to look for a new tonearm and base in better shape... Sorry.

[CarlosV]

Maybe a silly question, but have you checked if the turntable is sitting too high above the motorboard?
Another point is that these tonearms are supported on a ball bearing, formed onto the tonearm ring and the Base, and I've found sometimes issues with this. If there's too much wear on the ball races the tonearm wouldn't sit properly no more, and what is worst, if it had been mistreated or kicked at some position, the hard steel balls leave marks on the soft bronze ball races, resulting in a quirky tonearm movement across the records as the balls pass over these marks. There's not an easy repair for that problem, the ball races and end rings having to be reshaped and readjusted on a machine, and the balls substituted by new ones of slightly larger size. The best is to look for a new tonearm and base in better shape... Sorry.

Inigo has a good point: the problem of the tone arm height could be remedied by checking the turntable installation, or with placing an elevating ring between the tone arm base and the plinth, but the sticky movement is more complicated and not helped by the pot metal fragility. Even disassembling the arm from its base can be catastrophically tricky, as I found out when trying to dismount the arm on a small Columbia 100 - both arm and base ended up cracked. On the brighter side, Columbia more or less standardized its components, so finding another complete arm will not be that hard. This is what I would do, it is worthwhile, this machine is probably the best-sounding of the Viva Tonals, and looks good as well.

[nostalgia]

I took some photos of the tonearm on my 156a. I can see no cracks anywhere but look at this strange angle? How can this happen to two tonearms on the same Columbia model? It could be interesting to measure the angle betweeen the base and the tonearm on both these tonearms, to see if they are exactly the same, or not.

[phonosandradios]

Your lucky not to have any cracks as mine has stress cracks at the back where the metal has been pulled and also at the front where things have been compressed. I was also thinking isn't it a strange co-incidence that two tone arms on the same model are bent in a very similar way. I think mine is more extreme as the crook of the tone arm is only just above the level of the turntable. Even with a needle in the sound box it doesn't make contact with the record rather it is the part of the soundbox further back that catches against the record.

I've basically written mine off and am looking for a new one. I do wonder how it happened though there are no marks on the underside of the lid to indicate anything being trapped as the lid was lowered. Perhaps they were trying to get the turntable off and lent on the arm in their struggle to remove it. Who knows!

[soundgen]

I took some photos of the tonearm on my 156a. I can see no cracks anywhere but look at this strange angle? How can this happen to two tonearms on the same Columbia model? It could be interesting to measure the angle betweeen the base and the tonearm on both these tonearms, to see if they are exactly the same, or not.

It's definitely bent someone has leant on it or somehow dropped the lid on it

[nostalgia]

Someone must have leant on it, since this is a very deep gramophone, where the lid is far away from the tonearm.

Out of curiosity phonosandradios, could you measure the angle between the base of the tonearm and the tonearm itself (or measure the distance from the edge of the black base to the auto stop component on the tonearm (whatever that is called), or potentially take a photo and upload? I would do the same, to see how different they really are.

I took some photos, with straightened out tonearm

[phonosandradios]

I don't have anything to measure angles but what I could do is to stand it upright as it would be in operation and measure the vertical distance between the bottom of the crook of the tone arm and the surface below. If we compare this should give an indication as to how similar the bend is. I'm working at the moment but will do it later today.

[nostalgia]

It will be interesting, you can now see my photos. 17,7 cm from the end of the black base to the end of the straighetned out tonearm.

[phonosandradios]

Here is mine - curiosity got the better of and I nipped out to the garage to have a look