The Talking Machine Forum — For All Antique Phonographs & Recordings

As mick_vt said, if you greased the wrong things, it won't run very well. This is especially true of the governor. The bearing points and the shaft of the governor need to be oiled with a light machine oil. The governor disc has to be able to slide on the shaft.. Also, make sure the bearing points of the governor are not pushed in too tight. There needs to be a little bit of end-to-end play in the governor or it won's spin properly. The governor pads also need oil.

I once encountered a similar problem with a much later machine (H.M.V. Model 101 portable, made by the British equivalent of Victor in the late 1920s). Invariably I found that if I cleaned the record – any shellac record, from the 1890s to the 1950s – it would then play at a steady speed without any further difficulty, whereas before cleaning it would lose speed as soon as it came to a loud passage, or almost at once if the record was an early or worn one. I clean records of all periods with ordinary general-purpose spray polish and have been doing so for at least forty years with no ill effects.

Oliver Mundy.