Green Box Amberols?

[Valecnik]

They would be Edison Amberols- 4 minute wax records that are played with a sapphire needle, as found in Model H, K etc reproducers.
They are extremely fragile, & can break just from the heat of your hand, so be careful with them.
Most tend to have high surface noise, which is unfortunate as there's some great music on them that was never transfered to blue amberol.
4 min Amberols have "4M-" before the record number on the rim of the cylinder.

Shane, In addition to breaking more easily and wearing more easily, you are right that the 4 min wax amberols tend to have higher surface noise. They must have all sounded quite excellent when new though, at least most of them. I've got a few very clean ones that are so loud and clear with an O or M reproducer that they are comparable to the blue amberols, even louder than BAs but less bottom range.

[FellowCollector]

Personally I think they play better than the 2 Min wax and don't have the mold problem.

Larry

I agree Larry. They are by far the quietest and clearest cylinders I own. In my experience they are much better than the later wax, but they are indeed fragile.

Dan

With regard to the 4 minute Edison wax Amberols versus the later Edison 2 minute wax cylinders and their quality of play, I have found that a lot depends on how they had been stored. The later Edison 2 minute cylinders (ie. those in the higher 10,000 series) appear to have surfaces similar to the Edison 4 minute Amberols - and therefore are less susceptible to mold. As an example, several years ago I purchased a good sized lot of Edison 2 minute wax cylinders all from the same home that were stored in a less than ideal environment (uncontrolled temperature and humidity). I found that all of the earlier ones had sustained varying degrees of mold growth - yet the late ones (again, those in the higher 10,000 series) had none and played nicely. I have found that Edison 4 minute wax Amberols that have been stored in a less than perfect environment (ie. high humidity and vast temperature changes such as a New England attic would yield) will not have the mold spots but the surface is in fact affected and these will play with some surface noise. And, as mentioned above I have found that Edison 4 minute wax Amberols that have been stored in a nice temperature and humidity-controlled environment provide a stunning performance with play. Finally, and sadly, I have also found that some of the Edison Amberols are simply reaching their life expectancy no matter what their storage conditions have been and are cracking with no apparent external temperature or handling influence. Perhaps this is due to their particular composition but with that in mind I have been recording some of the more scarce titles from my wax Amberol collection just in case. The 4 minute Amberols can have some unusual titles and are a real pleasure to play when you find them in nice condition. I buy every one I find for that reason.

[antique1973]

Celluloid cylinders will wear a sapphire stylus much quicker than the conical diamond styli that was designed to play them. The groove dimensions are the same though, so a 4 minute sapphire will fit the BA groove.

Oh ok, so its probably not a good idea to play the BA's with the sapphire
stylus in general. I am not planning on parting with my Amberola 30 anytime
soon anyways, so I will just use it for BA's exclusively.

[Valecnik]

I have found that Edison 4 minute wax Amberols that have been stored in a nice temperature and humidity-controlled environment provide a stunning performance with play. Finally, and sadly, I have also found that some of the Edison Amberols are simply reaching their life expectancy no matter what their storage conditions have been and are cracking with no apparent external temperature or handling influence. .

Yes I've had the sad experience of gently sliding one of my favorite 4M amberols out of the box only to have it literally break apart in my hand.

[OrthoSean]

Yup, me too. I've gone through two copies of Marie Dressler's "He's My Soft Shell Crab On Toast". Both just shattered on me. It was never released on BA, a shame since it's a great record of hers. At least I've got a nice transfer of it I can enjoy, but it sure is nice hearing them on the Triumph with the model O and the oak horn. I play my wax amberols very rarely these days.

Sean

[gramophoneshane]

Me three! "Pick on me" by Ada Jones...Went to play it oneday, and it had a crack straight up one side
Again, it wasn't released on BA.
Now that Vulcan/Wizard are making 4 min cylinders, I keep living in hope that they'll reproduce some of the Amberols that didn't make it to celluloid.

[Lenoirstreetguy]

I cursed wax Amberols for years as noisy and fragile and wondered how on earth they could have got anyone to buy them. Then quite recently I ran across several that were almost as quiet as a Blue Amberol and I realized how in fact they held their own against the disc: they sounded great when they were new. I think part of our problem today stem from the fact that the chemical department in Orange continually fiddled with the formula for the wax hoping against hope to get it harder but less brittle, so I have read. I have begun to suspect that some of their concoctions age better then others, so it's the luck of the draw as to what one finds. But just this past spring I had an Albert Spalding " Special" self destruct when I slid it ever so gently on the mandrel: a quarter of it dropped off. It's very annoying.
Every collector asks why they didn't toss in the towel and buy the rights to celluloid earlier than 1912. I've read that one reason was the fact that in 1907 they had built, at significant cost, their own gas plant to manufacture gas to heat the wax vats.But just recently I read that article about the moulding process which appeared in the Michigan Antique Phono Newsletter. It was a reprint of an article which had appeared circa 1910. And reading it, one realized that by the late 00's Edison had semi- automated the moulding process: one worker could produce umpty- ump cylinders per hour, hence the cost per unit would be low. The Blue Amberol system took two workers per press and was more work intensive and slower, thus increasing the unit cost. Still doesn't quite get them off the hook for not switching sooner
Jim

[Skihawx]

I wish the Sophie Tucker's were released on Blue
Amberols. I haven't playeed my edison for quite a while but
always liked the 4Min wax titles and artists. Grace Cameron,
Anna Chandler, Stella Mayhew, Irene Franklin, Murray K Hill,
Just ths sweet spot for Edison cylinders. The really late
2 Min are the same but really hard to find!

[gramophoneshane]

I think another contributing factor to surface noise on some 4M wax is due to previous (and present) owners playing them with the same sapphire they've been playing BA's with.
It only takes a couple plays for celluloid to begin to wear the sapphire, & as soon as it does, the stylus starts to cut into the hard wax.
I've found that by using a sapphire ONLY on wax, you can very seldom wipe black dust from the stylus after playing a record, but if you've played a few BA's with it before, then you'll always wipe black dust from the needle after playing an Amberol. In bad cases, the dust will build up enough during one play, to cause the stylus to jump a groove after a few seconds of poor sound quality.

[antique1973]

Just got back from LA and picked up the cylinders and diamond discs.
Mostly wax amberols with matching lids. Not a bad haul for $60!