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The ratchet pawl for my Amberola 30 failed - wound up the spring and it caught - for a second - then it broke loose and the spring and crank handle spun backwards for about 1 second, releasing all the energy of the wound up spring. Pretty scary.

Tried to wind it up again but there was nothing on the other end of the crank handle. Took it apart and found the force of the ungoverned unwinding was sufficient to actually bend the center end of the spring back on itself, breaking the tip off in the process. This is the same machine that bit Jerry B. on the thumb some time back, I was lucky, no damage to me.

Attached is a photo of the result of the back-spin.

Bummer.

CDB

Wow, that looks real scary! Glad you didn't get hurt! In my early days of collecting, I suffered a gouge as wide as the brass worm wheel on a governor of an Amberola 30 because I loosened the governor on top forgetting that the machine was all wound up. When it released all it's energy at once, the worm wheel sliced through my finger like a chain saw!

Cliff,
With your skills, you'll get that machine running in no time.
Harvey Kravitz

Maybe you should have it neutered - it might make it less aggressive.

Lucius1958 wrote:Maybe you should have it neutered - it might make it less aggressive.

Hmmmm....some days you get the bear; other days the bear gets you.

Here is a video of the incident. Didn't know the camera was still running..

http://youtu.be/b5RXOfQL4jM

CDB

I was surprised there was no profanity...until the very end, that is. I think a not-so-nice word would have escaped my lips when it let loose!

coyote wrote:I was surprised there was no profanity...until the very end, that is. I think a not-so-nice word would have escaped my lips when it let loose!

You'll note a few short segments of the video were muted...

I think it's haunted!. You can see an "orb" coming down at 15 seconds.

At least the problem with the ratchet pawl has been fixed. I made a little doohickey out of a wire spring and that should ensure the pawl will always engage when it's supposed to. Apparently, the original wire has gone missing.

CDB