The Talking Machine Forum — For All Antique Phonographs & Recordings

The previous photo of an Edison B-80 with an oak record cabinet may be amputated as I don't see any legs. I base this on the following picture showing a mahogany B-80 with its matching cabinet:

My matching B-80 cabinet has 6" tall legs just like the last photo.

Ditto.

George P.

My cabinet also has legs. It is shown here with my B 19.

Best,
Fran

marcapra wrote:The grease inside the spring barrel in both my B-60 and 80 was so foul it stank! It probably hadn't been opened since 1912!

Back in the old days, grease was virtually anything that was greasy. Lots of grease was a very crude goo, unrefined and often smelly. Edison specified Vaseline as the grease to use because it was fairly common and of a consistent high quality. This precluded use of less refined grease products and assured a higher quality lubrication. Might be this less refined grease was used in your machines...

I was wondering if the B-60 and B-80 originally came with grille cloth? My B-60 doesn't have any. My B-80 has a light brown cloth under the top grille behind the turntable. I'm thinking maybe this light brown cloth was also used on the horn grille? both of my horns are wood grain with an oak color. I think the last B-80s may have had black horns, so maybe the grille cloth was only put on those? But I dont' know, just guessing.

marcapra wrote:I was wondering if the B-60 and B-80 originally came with grille cloth? My B-60 doesn't have any. My B-80 has a light brown cloth under the top grille behind the turntable. I'm thinking maybe this light brown cloth was also used on the horn grille? both of my horns are wood grain with an oak color. I think the last B-80s may have had black horns, so maybe the grille cloth was only put on those? But I dont' know, just guessing.

It's problematic.

My A-80 (SN 1865) has a grain painted horn, but also had traces of grille cloth. It also (as far as I could tell from the seller) had a later style reproducer, with the cast lugs (A12802), when his immigrant grandparents bought it. It is possible (this is all conjecture, however) that the machine had sat unsold in some dealer's store, until they sold it off to some folks fresh off the boat.

Certainly, the early machines did not have grille cloth: but enough machines survive with grained horns and original cloth to suggest that the Company started adding it on older models.

Bill

Adding a photo of a B-60 motor in its cabinet in case that might be of future use.

I note the earlier semispherical governor weights (typically seen on A-series motors) on that B-series motor. Apparently another example of gradual changes...

George P.