Value of amberol cylinders
-
- Victor Jr
- Posts: 19
- Joined: Thu Aug 26, 2021 8:27 pm
Value of amberol cylinders
I’m looking at buying more amberol cylinders and I see asking prices all over the map, usually with no listing of titles. Chances are there will be a lot of overlap with my current collection. How do I determine a fair price given I might want to resell some? Any guidance would be appreciated.
- drh
- Victor IV
- Posts: 1218
- Joined: Tue May 27, 2014 12:24 pm
- Personal Text: A Pathé record...with care will live to speak to your grandchildren when they are as old as you are
- Location: Silver Spring, MD
Re: Value of amberol cylinders
Asking the value of "amberol cylinders" is like asking the value of "Victor records." Everything depends on title, artist, and condition of the individual issue. Personally, I ignore a listing if a seller doesn't specify at least titles and artists. Are you looking at bulk lots? Without more, you're likely to end up with the world's largest collection of Henry Burr singing "I'll Take You Home Again, Kathleen" and Harry Lauder singing "It's Nice to Roam in the Gloamin' on a Sunday Morning."Burt68 wrote: ↑Fri Sep 10, 2021 11:31 am I’m looking at buying more amberol cylinders and I see asking prices all over the map, usually with no listing of titles. Chances are there will be a lot of overlap with my current collection. How do I determine a fair price given I might want to resell some? Any guidance would be appreciated.
- Roaring20s
- Victor V
- Posts: 2571
- Joined: Wed Jun 13, 2012 1:55 am
- Personal Text: Those who were seen dancing were thought insane by those who could not hear the music. Nietzsche
- Location: Tucson, AZ
Re: Value of amberol cylinders
I'll expand on what DRH has said ...
If you are wanting specific titles, keep notes on what they have sold for. That is the current market value. Like any collectable, the more desirable it is, expect to pay more for it, and have more competition obtaining it. You can wait for years to try find a favorite song cheap, you may never obtain it. Sometimes you will get lucky.
If you do not want the overlap in records, you must ignore bulk sales - unless you have the opportunity to see them first and the space to store them. This usually involves resale of the unwanted records. Be sure you want to do that!
You will likely end up staying focused, spending a bit more money on what you want, and enjoy your hobby now.
James.
PS: Read the YANKEE TRADER GUIDELINES and place a Wanted ad for titles you want.
If you are wanting specific titles, keep notes on what they have sold for. That is the current market value. Like any collectable, the more desirable it is, expect to pay more for it, and have more competition obtaining it. You can wait for years to try find a favorite song cheap, you may never obtain it. Sometimes you will get lucky.
If you do not want the overlap in records, you must ignore bulk sales - unless you have the opportunity to see them first and the space to store them. This usually involves resale of the unwanted records. Be sure you want to do that!
You will likely end up staying focused, spending a bit more money on what you want, and enjoy your hobby now.
James.
PS: Read the YANKEE TRADER GUIDELINES and place a Wanted ad for titles you want.
- drh
- Victor IV
- Posts: 1218
- Joined: Tue May 27, 2014 12:24 pm
- Personal Text: A Pathé record...with care will live to speak to your grandchildren when they are as old as you are
- Location: Silver Spring, MD
Re: Value of amberol cylinders
...and in turn I'll add a bit to the good advice James just offered: if you are looking at eBay to get prices, go to "advanced search" and look at prices realized for listings that actually sold. Don't go by prices in active, unsold listings. People will ask anything and everything for opening bids or "buy it now," and those figures are worse than meaningless, usually the delusions of somebody who just inherited a few beat-up commonplaces from Great Aunt Harriet and thinks they'll finance that next vacation in Bermuda. By the same token, though, be careful not to misinterpret a "fluke." Once in a while, someone will grossly over- or under-pay for something. If you see four or five sold listings for something, and one went for $50 but all the others were between $5 and $10, figure the thing was "worth" $5 to $10 and one seller got lucky. By the same token, if several listings of something went for around $50 but one brought only $5, don't count on being able to buy one for $5.
- Curt A
- Victor Monarch Special
- Posts: 6434
- Joined: Fri Jul 09, 2010 8:32 pm
- Personal Text: Needle Tins are Addictive
- Location: Belmont, North Carolina
Re: Value of amberol cylinders
One other tip that is just my personal preference. Avoid 4min black wax Amberol cylinders, unless you get them cheap and won't regret if they end up shattered. They were made from an inferior wax formula that tends to break, just for the heck of it. If they get cold or if you exert too much pressure changing them or the mandrel is a different temperature from the cylinder, or if you just look at them wrong, they break. Celluloid Blue Amberols or 2/4 minute celluloid Indestructibles are my favorites.
"The phonograph is not of any commercial value."
Thomas Alva Edison - Comment to his assistant, Samuel Insull.
"No one needs a Victrola XX, a Perfected Graphophone Type G, or whatever you call those noisy things."
My Wife
Thomas Alva Edison - Comment to his assistant, Samuel Insull.
"No one needs a Victrola XX, a Perfected Graphophone Type G, or whatever you call those noisy things."
My Wife
-
Onlineepigramophone
- Victor Monarch Special
- Posts: 5234
- Joined: Mon Oct 24, 2011 1:21 pm
- Personal Text: An analogue relic trapped in a digital world.
- Location: The Somerset Levels, UK.
Re: Value of amberol cylinders
Postage costs make buying cylinders singly an expensive business. I normally buy job lots, keeping those that I want and selling on those that I don't. Again to save on postage costs for the buyer, I only sell cylinders as job lots.
I have found YouTube to be a valuable resource for listening to cylinders prior to purchase. The chances are that someone somewhere will have posted a YouTube clip of most of the cylinders you are interested in.
I have found YouTube to be a valuable resource for listening to cylinders prior to purchase. The chances are that someone somewhere will have posted a YouTube clip of most of the cylinders you are interested in.
- Inigo
- Victor VI
- Posts: 3779
- Joined: Mon Dec 18, 2017 1:51 am
- Personal Text: Keep'em well oiled
- Location: Madrid, Spain
- Contact:
Re: Value of amberol cylinders
And another source are the podcasts of our colleagues at the forum, and also the Internet Archive at www.archive.org which has lots of cylinders fir listening online, even the rare ones.
Inigo
-
- Victor IV
- Posts: 1569
- Joined: Mon Mar 04, 2013 3:33 pm
Re: Value of amberol cylinders
There are so many titles on wax Amberol that were never put on the Blue Amberol. edisonplayer.
- Curt A
- Victor Monarch Special
- Posts: 6434
- Joined: Fri Jul 09, 2010 8:32 pm
- Personal Text: Needle Tins are Addictive
- Location: Belmont, North Carolina
Re: Value of amberol cylinders
You're right... they shattered before they could be copied...edisonplayer wrote: ↑Mon Sep 13, 2021 10:29 am There are so many titles on wax Amberol that were never put on the Blue Amberol. edisonplayer.
"The phonograph is not of any commercial value."
Thomas Alva Edison - Comment to his assistant, Samuel Insull.
"No one needs a Victrola XX, a Perfected Graphophone Type G, or whatever you call those noisy things."
My Wife
Thomas Alva Edison - Comment to his assistant, Samuel Insull.
"No one needs a Victrola XX, a Perfected Graphophone Type G, or whatever you call those noisy things."
My Wife