1932/34(???) Edison Electric Pickup/Reproducer

[GroverOverton08]

I remember at one point reading about these being patented in Britain around the early 30s. I don't recall much else, though. Does anyone know if these were actually manufactured or existent?

[edisonclassm]

you are referring to the Sykes Electrograph reproducer made in England mid 30's. They were made to play Blue Amberol cylinders. The only electric pickups manufactured by Edison were for his disc phonographs the C-2 and C-4

[hameleer]

Here is an orginal Sykes Electrograph reproducer playing on Youtube:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p00X5Ns7BqQ

[ChuckA]

I remember at one point reading about these being patented in Britain around the early 30s. I don't recall much else, though. Does anyone know if these were actually manufactured or existent?

If interested here is the patent for the Sykes reproducer.

Sykes Patent-SM.pdf

(1.05 MiB) Downloaded 8 times

The patent also covers a unit for Diamond Discs and one for lateral cut discs. Never seen one those or even heard of any produced.
I have one mounted to an Edison Standard, it plays well but the only drawback is that it is very sensitive to out of round cylinders or with any imperfections.
The best cylinders I have found to play for demonstration are Indestructible cylinders they seem have the best "roundness?"
A cylinder that sounds great on a acoustic Diamond B will have a very noticeable periodic thump where the cylinder is slightly out of round when played on the Sykes.

Sykes Patent-SM.pdf

(1.05 MiB) Downloaded 8 times

Chuck

[drh]

...I have one [Sykes reproducer] mounted to an Edison Standard, it plays well but the only drawback is that it is very sensitive to out of round cylinders or with any imperfections.
The best cylinders I have found to play for demonstration are Indestructible cylinders they seem have the best "roundness?"
A cylinder that sounds great on a acoustic Diamond B will have a very noticeable periodic thump where the cylinder is slightly out of round when played on the Sykes. ...

That tracks with my experience playing cylinders on the electronic Wilson Home, which isn't limited to 4-minute celluloid. I had the impression US Everlasting gave the best results (although I don't have enough of those for a statistically valid sample), followed by Indestructible (ditto), with Blue Amberols more often than not having pitch stability and thump issues. As you noted, those sorts of problems are much less noticeable on acoustic machines. Wax cylinders, 2- or 4-minute, were more consistently satisfactory for electronic playback, but the wax Amberols have their own problem, the tendency to be excessively worn or damaged from acoustic playback.

I wrote a lengthy three-part review of the Wilson that itself includes audio samples of various cylinder types electronically reproduced, and in one case directly compared to an Edison Triumph, and at the end a link to a YouTube video I put together demonstrating electronic playback of a wide array of cylinder types, including Pathé Salon size. Here's a link: https://www.tnt-audio.com/vintage/wilson3_e.html

[edisonclassm]

I find the best sounding records using this device are the Edison acoustically recorded Blue Amberols providing they are in good shape and don't have and surface irregularities like Chuck said. I feed the signal from mine into an Edison C-2 so I can get a really authentic sound. It's fun to listen to cylinders electrically.

[Homestead]

I hope someone makes some replicas of these. Could use 3-D printer for case. I saw previous article about that a week or so ago. I hope it comes to fruition...Id like to get one.