Records from the 40s

[Guest]

I've got a set of phonograph records from 1940 that my great-grandfather recorded right before he died. The sound quality is pretty terrible, to the point that I can't even clean up the sound in Audacity. I am wondering if anyone knows about a different type of needle that I might need, or if these records simply degrade over time. I know they're not magnetic media, so the sound should stay the same indefinitely. Can anyone help me with this?

It's also possible that the recordings were terrible.

[estott]

I'll take a guess that your records are direct cut acetate discs. Is the surface a clean and even black or does it have a whitish filmy haze over it? The mention that the tone quality is very bad would make me suspect they are home recordings, made on a Wilcox-Gay machine or some thing similar. Commercial acetates can deteriorate over time but Wilcox-Gay discs can go real bad- elements in the coating will ooze out leading to a messy surface and the loss of material in the grooves.

[martinola]

Guest, can you describe what they look like? (ie: black lacquer on metal, glass? or are they just straight aluminum? how about labels? pictures can help too.) There were various processes used over the years with various widths of cuts. Some were recorded as vertical rather than lateral. I once transferred a badly damaged one for a friend that was from WWII. The label was gone, it was badly scratched and the lacquer was starting to flake off, so we didn't dare clean it except for a light dusting with a camel's hair brush. It turned out to be recorded from inside to outside with a vertical cut! Obviously, all of that doesn't help you if nobody bothered to get the mike close enough to make a decent recording. But, stick with it. Any opportunity to hear your own family's past is priceless, even if there's a lot of surface noise. I wish mine had made some recordings. If I can help, I will try. Please give us an update.

Regards,
Martin

[Steve E.]

What are you playing the discs on?? I recommend strongly that you NOT play them on an acoustic machine. Although you do say you are trying to clean them up in Audacity so I doubt you are doing that.