Silvertone Soundbox overhaul ?

[De Soto Frank]

I just acquired a nice Silvertone upright, more or less as Victrola X / XI clone, in golden oak, in pretty nice cosmetic condition.

In fact, it has the nicest, brightest nickel plating I have ever seen on an old machine.

The soundbox (Sears' version of a Victor Exhibition), needs overhaul.

Replacing the diaphragm gaskets is atraight-forward, but there appear to be the fossilized remains of some rubber pads or bushings where the needle-bar attaches to the body of the soundbox ?

Also, are there any sources for the rubber isolator bushing where the box mounts to the gooseneck arm ?

I've attached some photos from the interwebs, to show the particular sound-box in question...

[mikejk]

Bummer! thats the one I was bidding on tonight and lost. Hopefully another will come up. This one has a better design than the one's I now have, which have the screwed in ring in the front to hold the gaskets in.

[De Soto Frank]

For the sake of full disclosure, I was not chasing this particular sound-box; I just grabbed the photos.


My digi-cam has been acting grumpy lately, and I haven't been able to shoot pics of my own.

[estott]

I didn't replace the little rubber bits in the needle bar suspension, but you could use small bits of rubber with a hole poked in them. There is no replacement for that isolator - you have to look for an auto hose of the right thickness & cur a piece. Mine is is decent shape so I've wrapped the end of the arm in plumbers tape to improve the fit.

[mikejk]

When I rebuilt mine, I used small sections of the hollow rubber gasket tube on the needle bar springs, the wrong color, but works well. Made the rear rubber tone arm mount out of rubber auto vacuum hose, can't remember the size.

[De Soto Frank]

Okay... I dug into this a bit this evening.

Turns-out my sound-box is slightly different: once-piece body, solid back. Diaphragm held in place by a threaded ring, like a Columbia. "Patented June 17-19"

The needle-bar business is the same.

The tone-arm mounting bushing is still fairly pliable.


I used a pair of #89 Danco neoprene O-rings (2-½" OD x 1-5/16" ID x 3/32 thick) from the plumbing section of my local ACE Hardware for diaphragm gaskets, until I can order some white rubber. For the needle-bar insulators, I used the smallest O-rings I could find: # 60 Danco, (¼" x ⅛" x 1/16" thick - about twice as large as I needed)...

Trying to figure-out how to tighten the diaphragm ring... it has no spanner holes, lugs, nubs or anything that would assist turning it... just a smooth-faced ring...

Will add some photos soon...

[mikejk]

My Silvertone sound boxes are the same kind you are mentioning, as I mentioned in my last post. When I tightened the gasket retaining ring I used only my fingars. It doesn't want to be too tight and gasket thickness is important so you have enough room to start threading the ring in. I used the size gasket that is used in the Exhibition, and even that seemed a little too thick, but it did thread in.

[estott]

When you get the white tubing it has to be thin- otherwise you can't screw the ring in place. You must also be careful that the hole in the diaphragm doesn't get off center.

[De Soto Frank]

The white tubing that came out was squashed a bit flat, the outr ring more so than the inner ring... if I average the section thickness, it comes-out to around ⅛" inch round ( when it was round ).


I just put it on the machine and took it for a test spin, a Victor arch-label acoustic # 18698-B "My Little Bimbo", perf. by Benson Orch of Chicago, a fairly perky one-step.

The Silvertone performed politely, with no blasting or rattling, but even with a loud needle, I don't think it was ever one to blow the doors off a room.

I put the same record on my Columbia Mignonette upright, with a similar needle, and it played quite a bit louder.


I then tried the only electrical record I had handy, a 1940's Musical Masterpiece Society 12", finale to Beethoven's 5th Symphony. This did cause some blasting and distortion with the Silvertone, and even a little bit on the Columbia...

At home, I generally play my Victrolas with medium or soft-tone needles, otherwise they will chase me out of the room...

[estott]

My Silvertone played at relatively low volume, I improved things by tightening the joint between the soundbox and the arm to improve pressure. There's a major leak at the vertical pivot though that can't be fixed. Using a Victrola #2 soundbox also improves the sound.

I also found that the cast wood grille on mine blocks some sound - removing it does raise the volume a bit.