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i have a blue amberol cylinder that has a band that's lighter that's around 1/8th of the length of the cylinder. when played the lighter area sounds scratchy, and repeats. there's a video showing it hopefully attached. if you cant access the video pls tell me.

Someone played it with a damaged stylus and carved it up.

thanks! were you able to watch the video? i just want to see if its available to you cus it shows the damage.

phonograph guy3435 wrote: ↑Mon Apr 01, 2024 8:23 pm thanks! were you able to watch the video? i just want to see if its available to you cus it shows the damage.

Yes, I saw the video. It sounds about how you would expect, given how it looks.

Looks and sounds like it was played with a reproducer with a damaged stylus causing the bad section on the cylinder.

Rich Gordon

stylus was bad or the pressure was too great. I did this to the very first cylinder I owned with my first Amberola 30. I need to make a video about that record someday.

According to the Frow and Dethlefson book on the cylinder phonograph, early production of the blue amberols ran into wear issues. I will have to look it up again as it has been many years since I studied this. I have a bunch of similar records myself and I do not think it is due to a bad stylus playback.

In the process of moulding the cylinders, they were treated to the blue dye solution which in addition to providing the distinctive color, also hardened the surface of cylinder surface. Batches of cylinders from early 1913 were not treated properly and the cylinders wore out prematurely. The factory isolated the problem and was corrected after a large lot of defective cylinders were sold. The Edison policy was if the customer complained, the cylinders would be replaced at no cost. But no effort was made to advertise the defective merchandise.

I have a number of early cylinders so effected. They are all the early flat ended cylinders. Some of these bad cylinders have bands of noise across the record similar to yours. Others have patches of noise where the wear seems isolated more to one side than the other.

I think you have one of the bad 1913 batch of bad cylinders.

thanks for the answer! That cylinder does not have a flat end so I don't think it's the 1913 batch. i do have a few other cylinders with a flat end, are those all faulty too?

I have a few cylinders from the 1913 to 1914 period that seem to have worn prematurely I will have to see if it affected bevel ended cylinders
However this wear problem seemed to affect the earliest blue amberols.
Further I have found the cylinders tend to be a purplely blue color and traces of the white celluloid may wear through.