The Talking Machine Forum — For All Antique Phonographs & Recordings

LaoChe85 wrote: Sat Aug 30, 2025 12:01 pm Update:
I have sent the governor off to John Sleep to fix and received it back yesterday. I have put it back in and adjusted the speed regulator as well as replaced the pad. All seems to work fine on the motor now apart from the governor itself making a lot of noise - like a whirring noise. As far as I can tell, its not coming into contact with anything so I'm a little confused as to what it could be, if anyone could hazard a guess that would be great!

My next move is to fix the sound box but it turns out John didn't have a replacement rubber isolator so I've decided to make it myself. John Sleep recommended car tyre inner tubes and I will see how much this costs but I was also thinking just of making it out of the same material my washers were for the motor board (obviously in a thinner sheet though). If anyone has any suggestions on this, I would be grateful.

The governor weights/springs might still be out of balance in some way (relative weights, spring tension, fixings) although I would hope and trust that John used three identical components. More than once in the past I've had governor vibration that I solved by accurately weighing each weight and spring assembly, and filing tiny amounts off to make them equal.

The softer the better for rubber sheeting to cut the piece from for the back of the soundbox, I'd say.

I am going to upload some videos of the governor working as well as the sound it makes.

I have realised that the sound is only noticeable when the motor board is in the gramophone but it is still quite loud. When you play a record, it is fairly unnoticeable but it's still there. I hope these videos can help diagnose what its wrong because I can't honestly tell.

Thank you

The sound is somewhat normal. It may be due to wear in the end bearings. Try using a thicker oil to see if helps to deaden the noise a bit.

If you take the running motor in your hands, do you notice a vibration coming from the governor?

The sound is not so bad... although not perfect, that's true. If you take the running motor in your hands, do you notice a vibration coming from the governor?
You can also examine the rotating governor disc, in case you notice it is not true when running, so the vibration could be originated because of fast slight speed variation because of not uniform pressure of the disc against the felt pad of the governor brake. Also dirt on the disc can cause variable friction, variable speed and noise.
A bent governor axis end pin can also produce vibration, and in the end wear out the bearings. But it doesn't seem the problem.

Thanks for your reply Inigo,
I think I will try some thicker oil as a start to see if that works. As for the the vibration when the motor holding the motor, I will have to test this. I think it is worth mentioning I also replaced the governor break pad with some soft leather as the old one seemed to be too worn and not actually slowing down the motor to 78rpm. It is also possible that some motor grease is causing some varied friction perhaps? I'll have another look at the rotating disc to see if there are any issues, but as far as I could tell, I think it is running fine.

I have felt the motor and there is only a very slight amount of vibration but I would probably just put this down to the facts its moving and not because there's something wrong, if you know what I mean - it's moving so there's down to be some slight vibrations when it's working. I applied some thicker oil but I'm not sure this has made a difference. Another thing I tested was to see if my other gramophone (HMV 161) made any noticeable noises when running to see if I was just making it seem worse than it was but the 161 is almost silent. The only other thing I can think of is the turntable itself not being completely flat, I did try my hardest to get it to be as level as possible with my new rubber washers but it's still raised slightly on one side. So I'm still not entirely sure what to do.

In the 46 video (I watched it first with the cellphone, but now I'm watching it on the big PC screen) it's clear that the vibration comes from the three weights and their springs. When it rotates fast, you clearly see the three weights not reaching the same position apart from the axis. Likely the springs are not equally paired or they are not properly installed.
In cases like these I give a try to this: I unscrew a bit (caution with this!) the three springs at both ends, then run the motor a bit, and then stop slowly the governor, and re-tight the screws. This allows the springs to stretch by the weights as much as they can. Many of these springs have a round hole at one end and an elongated one at the other (or they have slightly oversized screw holes), what makes it posible to do this adjustment. The unscrewing must be careful; the only thing you want is to allow the springs to expand and set properly, then stop the motor softly, and reattach the screws.
If this doesn't work and still you see the vibration in the governor, you need to use a set of perfectly paired springs.
The three weights should be seen at the same distance from the axis when the governor is rotating at high speed.
If the three springs are detached from the governor and weights, when placed matched one on top of the other between your fingers, they must be exactly of the same length, and have the screw holes exactly on the same positions.

I did what you said Inigo and it seems I might have discovered the issue!
I let the governor run on slightly unscrewed screws and but tightening them again I realised one of the screws wouldn't tighten at all which means its cross threaded, so I think I need to rethread and find a slightly bigger screw. I also checked the sizes of each spring and they were all exactly the same so I think it's most likely down to the loose screw.

Could be. The governor runs at high speed and has inertia, but it's an animal extremely sensitive to the smallest unbalance...
Also needs the sliding disc to be straight, clean, smooth and uniform, so the brake pad runs evenly on it and the friction is uniform. The pressure and friction exerted by the pad are small, but must be uniform; otherwise you'll have noise and a fast wobble in the music (it is very fast, but noticeable in quiet and long treble piano notes, for instance). This also causes small fat variations on the governor speed, and the engaged gear train notices it as changes in the pressure between the gear teeth... The backlash enters in action, and you have these fast purring noises.