Devineau Biophone video

[TinfoilPhono]

I've had a lot of requests to make a video of my Devineau Biophone. Today I finally got myself organized to do it. You can see the amateurish results here:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=89EfhuiJaeI[/youtube]

It's a great machine, historically and visually, but as you can see it works very poorly. When I first got it 10 years ago I spent several hours cleaning, oiling, and adjusting it, and managed to get it to play most of one 10" record. Today I cleaned and oiled it again, and spent over an hour tweaking the adjustments to get it to play at all. This is the best I could get. On every other attempt, literally, the machine would grind to a halt as soon as the needle hit the record. It is very, very sensitive to get it to a point where the power transmission is strong enough to keep the turntable moving despite the weight of the reproducer. It astonishes me that any ever sold originally. $15 was a lot of money in 1907!

(Edited to embed link for viewing convenience)

[Brad]

Very cool, your video was not amateurish at all.

An interesting device. You made good points about why it didn't succeed. I could see one possible attraction is that you could have one machine, and consequently only one unit of table top allocated to a phonograph, while maintaining your investment in cylinders as you transitioned to disc.

I find most of my Edison cylinder machines to be finicky on power output. Perhaps when the machines were new, back in the day, their overall performance was better.

From another point of view, from the movie clip when it plays, maybe the device was good at taking normal recorded speech, and when played back on the biophone, it provided an excellent voice trainer

Thanks for posting.

[Starkton]

Did you try it on an Edison Triumph? Great to see it working!

[rodpickett]

Awesome!

[phonogfp]

I second Starkton's notion to mount the Biophone an a Triumph. After all, you and Henry Higgins both have alliterative names, so why not have the same phonograph/Biophone setup? Besides, the Biophone would work much better...

Nice video!

George P.

[TinfoilPhono]

Believe it or not, I don't own a Triumph to try it on. It's a good idea, I agree. I have an Idelia but the reproducer is a top-mount so it won't support the Biophone tonearm bracket. But -- the original advertising all showed a Standard. In theory that should be plenty powerful enough to do the job. In practice (obviously) it isn't. It remains a fascinating phonographic artifact but a very poor investment for anyone back in the day. But it's definitely one of my personal favorites.

[Edisone]

Believe it or not, I don't own a Triumph to try it on. It's a good idea, I agree. I have an Idelia but the reproducer is a top-mount so it won't support the Biophone tonearm bracket. But -- the original advertising all showed a Standard. In theory that should be plenty powerful enough to do the job. In practice (obviously) it isn't. It remains a fascinating phonographic artifact but a very poor investment for anyone back in the day. But it's definitely one of my personal favorites.

I doubt any phono could run that thing properly! But what an amazing display of Yankee Ingenuity! I've saved all of your YouTube videos. Thank you (really- THANKS!) for sharing with us, René !! (I still expect to hear a French accent when you speak, with that name)

[Lenoirstreetguy]

Fascinating! Impractical but fascinating. It looks like a piece of kinetic sculpture.
Thanks for posting this
JRT

[1923VictorFan]

That really is AMAZING! I have never heard of such a device. I'm dying to know where and how you found it as well as how did you know what it was? Thanks for the video

[phonogfp]

That really is AMAZING! I have never heard of such a device. I'm dying to know where and how you found it as well as how did you know what it was? Thanks for the video

Rene knew what it was because he has educated himself through his own experience and research, as well as owning many books on the subject of antique phonographs reflecting the research of others. The Devineau Biophone was featured on page 57 of Antique Phonograph Gadgets, Gizmos, and Gimmicks - a book that was published in 1999. There are around 15 books on antique phonographs that belong on every serious collector's bookshelf if they want to be able to recognize most of the artifacts they encounter. I must say that I'm continually surprised at the number of collectors who forego education (besides the Internet) and trust only to dumb luck. Not that dumb luck doesn't play a huge part of collecting, but as Allan Koenigsberg aptly put it, "The more you know, the luckier you get!"

George P.