Accidents Will Happen

[Wolfe]

In my earliest years of collecting, I was seated at a table near a window on a quiet day. I forget why, but I'd stood an unboxed 4M wax amberol record on the tabletop. It wasn't a hot day, but as the sun moved, the record was eventually no longer in the shade and the sunlight from the window had gradually begun to shine on it.

I was reading or something, but heard a very quiet "tick" from the record. Upon examination, a perfectly straight longitudinal crack revealed itself.

Tender, so tender they are.

Truth.

Not at all like the guy who started this thread. Drove off with a box of cylinders on the roof of his car. What a doof.

[BwanaJoe]

In my earliest years of collecting, I was seated at a table near a window on a quiet day. I forget why, but I'd stood an unboxed 4M wax amberol record on the tabletop. It wasn't a hot day, but as the sun moved, the record was eventually no longer in the shade and the sunlight from the window had gradually begun to shine on it.

I was reading or something, but heard a very quiet "tick" from the record. Upon examination, a perfectly straight longitudinal crack revealed itself.

Tender, so tender they are.

As a newbie, who has never dealt with cylinders, how fragile are these things? Starting to wonder about buying one if the cylinder machines.

[FloridaClay]

In my earliest years of collecting, I was seated at a table near a window on a quiet day. I forget why, but I'd stood an unboxed 4M wax amberol record on the tabletop. It wasn't a hot day, but as the sun moved, the record was eventually no longer in the shade and the sunlight from the window had gradually begun to shine on it.

I was reading or something, but heard a very quiet "tick" from the record. Upon examination, a perfectly straight longitudinal crack revealed itself.

Tender, so tender they are.

As a newbie, who has never dealt with cylinders, how fragile are these things? Starting to wonder about buying one if the cylinder machines.

Well it depends on what kind of cylinder records. Here are my kind of general guidelines for my own purchases--I am sure others may add theirs:

1--Early 2 minutes cylinders were made of a brown wax whose chemical properties are such that they attract moisture and are thus subject to mold. That being the case I avoid any with a spotty surface.
2--Later 2 minute wax cylinders (most often black in color) are much less susceptible to mold.
3--1 and 2, being wax, will break if you drop them on jam them on the mandrel, but will last if you use care in handling them and play them with a reproducer meant for use in playing them.
4--When Edison first came out with 4 minutes cylinders (Amberols--generally black), they were also made in wax. These are notoriously fragile. While I have a dozen or so bought before I realized that, they are the only kind I no longer buy. Too many have wound up in the trash can.
5--Over time some companies began to make 2 minute and 4 minute cylinders out of an early plastic called celluloid in various colors. Edison switched their 4 minute cylinders to celluloid also, known as Blue Amberols. These celluloid cylinders are pretty sturdy and are generally good as long as not cracked or warped.

Clay

[BwanaJoe]

Thanks. That works out well because my thought was to get a 30 or 50 at a later date.

[Victrolaboy]

Well, at least this didn't happen to a bunch of brown wax cylinders that would have been terrible!!
-Nick

[FloridaClay]

Thanks. That works out well because my thought was to get a 30 or 50 at a later date.

I have a 50, the first antique phonograph I bought. They are good solid machines if you get one in good condition.

Clay

[pughphonos]

Thought I'd use this thread as the most appropriate place to report my experience today in receiving a shipment of 20 wax Amberols (an E-bay purchase).

Guess how many were broken in shipment? Answer below: avert your eyes a bit and get to it in due time.

I was so upset when my first wax Amberol broke on me in 2005 that I avoided them for years. But I've gone back to collecting them--even thought it's like owning pets, knowing you're most likely going to outlive them. I've found that plastic cylinders--though indestructible--often have groove distortions from the decay of the plastic over 90-100 years--and with the Blue Amberols you get the additional problem of uneven Plaster of Paris cores. Whereas the wax Amberols hold their form (both groove-wise and core-wise) much better and I'm willing to put up with the risk of their imminent demise for the sake of reduced warble.

OK, the answer is: 4 out of the 20 were broken on arrival, which I don't consider to be excessive. But yes, I did have the duty of carting a bunch of wax fragments to the trash today.


Ralph

[Sidewinder]

The first edison I bought had been stored in an outbuilding with about 100 cylinders. All of which had been sampled........by rats

so all were either at start or end eaten into |`\/`|

[marcapra]

this doesn't involve cylinders, but getting back to the cause of your loss, the garage door opener, I was taking delivery of a friend's Jukebox to help him sell it. He unloaded it from his truck, and we put it on my homemade, large wooden dolly. We pulled it inside the garage, and he started checking out the jukebox. He wanted to see it with the lights on so he asked me to close the garage door. Then he started working on it again, and I asked him if he wanted me to open the garage door again to give him light. He said yes. But unknown to both of us was the fact that the corner of the big dolly was sitting right over the bottom lip of the garage door. As the garage door went up, he yelled at me to make it go down. I frantically pushed the button on the wall, but it kept going up until the dolly came loose and the jukebox came crashing down breaking its large glass dome to pieces. I've since learned that when you press the top half of the button, the door goes up, and when you press the bottom half, it goes down! Moral: keep your treasured items well away from garage doors!!!

[EarlH]

I sold a guy a 1912 style Oak XVI and a matching mahogany one last year and told him he would have to tie them down in the back of his pickup. He was 20 miles or so from where he could get some rope and of course he didn't. I have a full size pickup and didn't need to tie them down in the back. Plus, I don't drive that fast with a load. A couple of hours later he called me all upset because the oak one had flown out of the back of his truck and went under a semi that he was passing! I don't know why that was my fault, but I guess it was. It needed to be restored, but I guess they are a bit rarer now. He wants some other stuff I have and I'm thinking, no.