The Talking Machine Forum — For All Antique Phonographs & Recordings

Jon, Your pic automatically rotates back up when you click on it. Nice cabinet there.

gramophone-georg. Perhaps I need an education. Please show a photograph of a pre-electric Victor Record label that specifies tungsten needles. Please include the land around the label where the lead-out groove is.

That being asked, I would never use a tungsten needle on acoustic records. The grooves in those records are quite rough and not perfectly consistent in dimensionality from record to record. I cringe at the thought of a previously worn-in chisel tip being layed into the grooves of the next records.

The grooves on electric recordings are consistent from record to record, and even from brand to brand. I cringe a second time at the thought of playing an electric recording with a tungsten needle after it had been played on an acoustic recording.

Cheers, Russie

Check out the Tungs-tone section (page 9) of the Victrola XI manual dated 1920.

https://www.nipperhead.com/old/vicxi01.htm

startgroove wrote:gramophone-georg. Perhaps I need an education. Please show a photograph of a pre-electric Victor Record label that specifies tungsten needles. Please include the land around the label where the lead-out groove is.

That being asked, I would never use a tungsten needle on acoustic records. The grooves in those records are quite rough and not perfectly consistent in dimensionality from record to record. I cringe at the thought of a previously worn-in chisel tip being layed into the grooves of the next records.

The grooves on electric recordings are consistent from record to record, and even from brand to brand. I cringe a second time at the thought of playing an electric recording with a tungsten needle after it had been played on an acoustic recording.

Cheers, Russie

Sure Russie- here's one.

Interestingly enough, about half of my electric Bats don't mention needles at all, and I've never seen a Scroll that mentions "Tungs- Tone"- (not to say none exist- they might!)- they all just promote "Victor Needles".

TTs were around in the game far longer than electric recordings, and they most certainly were researched and developed LONG before, as AZ's link shows. I'm not a needle expert, but I think TTs were probably available from right around the end of WW1. If anyone has any exact data on the timeline it'd be a fun tidbit to know.

All of us have our own preferences and prejudices, and that's fine. I've used multi play needles like Chromiums and TTs for decades on all my machines and records with zero ill effects... but then I clean my records, too. In my experience, nothing trashes a record faster than playing it dirty.

Question for all the sworn "steel needle only" users because they're afraid other needles will ruin their records- what happens to the steel that wears off the needles? Does it get absorbed into the atmosphere?

I also disagree that grooves are consistent on electric recordings from brand to brand. The dime store labels like Madison, Grey Gull, etc., Plaza, Gennett, QRS (Cova Co) really seemed to lack quality control on a lot of their electric recordings up into the early 30s. To my casual observations in 50 years of fanatical collecting, it seems that consistent quality among brands didn't really happen until about 1935. In my observation, overall, quality control and consistency on acoustical recordings were actually somewhat better!

But then... 50 years into collecting I am still learning- and I am better than OK with that.

AZ* wrote:Check out the Tungs-tone section (page 9) of the Victrola XI manual dated 1920.

https://www.nipperhead.com/old/vicxi01.htm

Interesting- it shows a machine with the first design auto stop, too, e.g., pre- eccentric stopping groove, which I believe came into use in 1923.

Interesting how they note on P.9 that you should just use the TT until it stops reproducing. That's been my experience as well- after months of play it suddenly just won't track but no harm is done to the record.

Here's a reference from http://www.gracyk.com/needletips.shtml : "The most common packaging for Tungs-tone needles was a tin box that holds eight needles. The tins came later. When the "Tungs-tone" was introduced in 1916, the needles came in a punch-out card. The earliest ad I have seen for this new Victor product is from June 1916. There was trouble over the name when it was registered with the Patent Office, we learn from the August 15, 1916 issue of Talking Machine World. An article states, "The word was rejected by the United States Examiner of Trade-Marks at Washington until he was instructed from the office of the United States Commissioner of Patents to rule differently." The trade-mark examiner felt "Tungs-tone" was too close to "tungsten." In a similar ruling, "Tungsteel" was judged no good for razors and pocket knives. Anyway, Victor was allowed to use the name, and early ads always use a capital letter (Tungs-tone, not tungs-tone), giving the product more dignity."

The December issue of The Antique Phonograph has a detailed article about Tungs-tone needles written by Robert Baumbach. As Russie just posted, they were introduced in 1916 so they were around for over a decade before electric recording.

Thank you gramophone-georg for that picture and information. I'll update myself on that one!

Jonsheff I apologize for "hijacking' your topic. Yet, in researching the question about whether electrically recorded grooves were uniform dimensionally from record to record, I learned a lot. That knowledge I share here in summarized form:

The Western Electric recording system was made available to Victor in late 1924, for evaluation purposes. By the next year, Victor had acquired licensing to produce electrical recordings. Other brands obtained licenses as well. One of the defining aspects of electrical recording is that the “Mother” recording disc was made using a cutting tool with prescribed dimensions. Those dimensions (groove depth, groove angle, groove bottom radius), were factors that were consistent, or as consistent as possible, since the cutting tool itself was always formed to the same dimensions. The license included the cutting tool dimensions, thereby making all recordings which were made under the Western Electric patents as identical as possible (other record physical characteristics such as groove spacing, and lead in and lead out groove configurations were added.) This made it easier for manufacturers to make equipment which conformed to the record. In addition, this uniformity of record parameters paved the way for simpler record changing equipment and for permanent needles.
There were other systems which circumvented, or separately conquered, the electrical recording process, and probably created their own dimensionalities with respect to the recorded grooves. However, eventually all record manufactures followed the Western Electric lead.
References:
https://www.stokowski.org/Licensing_Wes ... lumbia.htm
https://www.stokowski.org/1925_First_El ... kowski.htm
https://ethw.org/Electrical_Recording
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_o ... _recording

Cheers, Russie

Jonsheff wrote:All excellent advice, i think i will be recommending Walt's soft tone steel needles and will get some for myself. These 16s and 17s do seem very loud and i think soft tone would do fine. I do intend on going thru and play my records once i finish my personal walnut 17 i have been working on for the last 2 weeks, it was in rough shape with lots of veneer water damage but is almost ready for the finish. I am looking forward to seeing this one completed. (Sorry for the rotated pic, i am in Florida visiting family and don't have access to my computer). Is there any way to rotate pics with this forum posting?

IMG_20191125_155545.jpg

Very nice work as usual. Is that the machine you were looking for veneer for?