The Talking Machine Forum — For All Antique Phonographs & Recordings

I asked Vulcan about new Concert titles just recently, this was Duncan's reply:

Regarding concert records, I do hope to get a new one out this year, they are pretty difficult to make the master and the mould compared with the standard size.

I have all of the ones Vulcan has made, and I love them. They sound great and I love the fact that they are unbreakable (having broken a very clean original Edison one day while putting it on the mandrel). But I would like a few more.

To add to the discussion of earlier messages within this posting regarding the skrinkage of Concert cylinders , I can confirm that original wax 5 inchers certainly can shrink over time. I have noticed shrinkage particularly in English Edison-Bell and French made Pathé Concert sized cylinders where they no longer fit the mandrel of say an Edison Concert phonograph. However , the situation can be remedied fairly easily -- I have several in my collection that would not fit when I acquired them , but they do now. It is a fairly simple process to slightly ream out the inside of the cylinder using ordinary sand-paper held by the hand. I actually use Aluminium - Oxide paper which is more hard-wearing. Just tear off a piece of the paper and fold it on itself a couple of times to make it more rigid , so the finished size is about 2 X 5 inches. Use only fine grade paper and slightly dish it along its length so that when placed inside the cylinder , it is readily held in place using your forefinger and middle finger only. I work on the floor , not on a table , and support the cylinder on a folded bath towel or other soft thick material. Fold the towel so that the cylinder will not easily
want to move to either side. Holding the record with one hand , work the folded sandpaper up and down the length of the inside of the cylinder at the same time turning the cylinder to keep the reaming evenly distributed around the cylinder. Naturally do not press too hard on the sand-paper , but light firm movements and you will see very fine wax dust being taken off . After about 10 or 12 movements of the sand-paper, check the record for fit on the mandrel as naturally you do not want to take too much off as the record will then be useless. You will find that it really doesn't need much to be removed and the record will soon fit the mandrel again with only a few minutes work. I have " rescued " about 2 dozen records by using this method. The reason I work on the floor ,is that it occurred to me that if by chance the cylinder when placed upon its towel did manage inadvertently to escape its protective position, then it wouldn't take much for it to accidentally roll away and off the table into pieces !
Incidentally , I also have Vulcan records " Liberty Bell March " -- I can thoroughly recommend Duncan Miller's products --- its a show-stopper for demonstrating to visitors! Dulcetto

If I can get the following parts for my HG/AG I will record new concerts, they will be high fidelity acoustic recordings (all know that I do better with acoustical recording than electrical recording.) I need a mandrel, the shaft, drive gear on the mandrel shaft, pulley and washers. and lower bedplate and crank. I also need a shaver attachment, It has the holes for one in the carriage. The trunnion was rebuilt by GPA and is wonderful! I will most likely mount an Ekonowatt Edison motor on a heavy steel piller and use this for the motor when recording, to have a steady speed and reduce warble.

I can probably make most of those parts if I can get dimensions. Washers, pulley, shaft, and lower bedplate.

It would be wonderful to start a database of making blueprints for rare machines, like the Class M,Opera, Graphophone Grand series, Edison Concerts. I don't have access to the pulley or mandrel dimensions and washers. I know some catalogs of Edison have photos of each part, is there anything like this for the Graphophone machines?


Thanks

Well hopefully someone can chime in, I would if I had any of those machines. I do have access to the usual array of metrology instruments as well as X-Ray machines and a CMM in the next few months (although that may be overkill).

It looks like Jean-Paul Agnard http://www3.sympatico.ca/jean-paul.agna ... uction.htm should have some of the mandrel dimensions.