Brunswick Panatrope with Radiola 138-C

[EarlH]

Well, I've been reading through this forum on and off for a long time and belonged to it a number of years ago and decided I would get my password sorted out and post a little bit about this Brunswick I bought last year. It will take me a few days or so to get it up to the present, but this is what I bought last year and I finally got it back together and playing yesterday. It really is incredible how good this thing sounds. I still can't get over the volume, clarity and bass response that Western Electric was able to extract out of the small speaker. I realize these pictures are awful, but I had a buddy of mine pick it up down in Kansas City and it got taken apart for the electric end of it to get restored before I was able to take any pictures of it. It kind of got to be a long drawn out affair as far as the restoration went, mainly because there really doesn't seem to be any detailed schematics out there on these things and most of the time the amplifiers end up getting robbed out of them and sold off to the audiofile types, and since they don't need them to also power a radio so it can be a little tricky trying to figure out how to go through them.
I'll get some more pictures posted of it as they are fascinating instruments and if you have one, by all means get that thing playing as they are really something to hear in person. When these things came out in 1926 or so people must have been completely stunned at what they were hearing. A good friend of mine knew a guy that sold these when they were new. That guys been dead for 35 years, but he told Terry many times about how wonderful these things were when they came out and how they went around to movie theaters demonstrating them. Kind of heavy for that, but not as bad as a piano!
You guys have some interesting discussions here and I'm glad I finally have something that I can add a little to the mix on.

[barnettrp21122]

Thanks for posting, and welcome to the forum!
I've had a growing interest in early electric machines, but they're certainly a different category than the acoustics. I wish I had skill in electronic repair, but I don't, so any projects need to be farmed out.
They can sound wonderful when properly rebuilt!
Bob

[startgroove]

Wow! Amazing machine. Fine looking cabinet too. Many years ago, I had an amplified Panatrope that had giant number 10 tubes in it. I was amazed at how good the early electric records sounded on that piece. Inspires me to go out and find one again. Cheers, Russie

[Springmotor70]

Welcome to the site - you have a great machine!

Yes that little Westinghouse speaker sounds amazing. I am still amazed by the power and clarity it can pump out early electric recordings especially NOS or EE+ records. Listening to a 1926 recording of Harry Reser pick away sounds much like an early 1960s hi-fi banjo recording! The Brunswick Panatrope manual says that with good placement it can fill the whole house with music. (and they are quite right)

For years I had only heard of Victor and Columbia's licensing of electrical recording from Westinghouse and their planned release date for November and the Christmas shopping season when the machines were ready to show and they had sold out much of their acoustic recordings.
It seems people often forget about Brunswick, they may have come a little later to the phonograph game but they jumped in with both feet by 1920, producing some amazing cabinets, perfecting their Ultona reproducer and then they sprinted to the finish line in 1925 pushing RCA to have an AC amp ready for what they billed "The World's First" all electric music reproducing machine. They beat Victor by a good 3 months before "Victor Day" when VTM was showing off acoustic reproduction of electrically recorded records.

Below is a photo of my P-11 - the model usually shown in ads with the "World's First". You can see the turntable is very similar to your 138-C but it still retains Brunswick's acoustic tonearm for the pick up. There is a switch for Radio whereas you could hook up your home set - the RCA amp could actually power your DC radio as well.

And by the way - people have thought I have a photo of Rudy Vallee on the console but that's my grandfather's cousin, George Bockwinkel who was a manager at Brunwick in Chicago

[EarlH]

Those P-11's are nice looking phonographs. Brunswick had a very confusing line of machines and cabinets and it almost seems endless as far as the cabinetry goes. They did get into the phonograph thing late because of all the patents starting to run out in the late teens. And also I suppose because they did make cabinets for Edison so they were set up for it in a way. But I also think because they were a younger company, they jumped into the all electric and radio thing as soon as they could. When you see old photographs of radio shops, you will often see Brunswick's in the picture. I don't know if I've ever seen Edison's or Victor stuff in those types of photographs. I'm sure it happened, but if you were happily selling the spring wound stuff, who would have wanted to deal with the service end of something that is a complete mystery? If those P-11's came with an input for radio that would make sense. Because if you already had a battery set you could amplify it though your Panatrope and not pay extra for another radio. Those have a little different amplifier in them because they needed a 99 tube in there, where those that came with a radio used one of the 99 tubes in the radio and that radio/phonograph switch shut off the tubes that weren't used when the phonograph was employed. They will definitely fill an average home, or average ballroom with music, that's for sure. I'm going to put a volume control in the tone arm circuit so I can control it a little better. Your P-ll has the earlier volume control with 4-5 settings. The later one has 10 settings. And there are a lot of variations with those things, and finding schematics for them is problematic. They have to be out there and most will say Victor used the same components and they did, but the schematics don't match exactly what you find in these. I'm not sure about the Victor stuff not having worked on any of it. I don't know how Victor dealt with those exposed tubes on the Radiola 28's in their machines as this Brunswick DOES NOT like having those 99 tubes exposed. It will really get to howling.
Here are some pictures of me refinishing it this summer. The original finish was probably ok on the inside of the cabinet, but really faded on the outside. The lacquer was very brittle even where it still looked like it was nice. I'm not finding some of the pictures back that I took, but you'll get an idea about it. I'll do some more digging. I refinished a bunch of stuff this summer and you can see some of it in the one photo. I am glad that I'm getting to the bottom of all of this stuff. I refinished four of these large Panatropes this summer and have one more to do next year. I'll be glad when it's done as they are a lot of work.
This one was bought new down in Kansas City in 1927 and I got it from the grandson of the original owner. He remembered it working into the late 1950's or early 60's and when his grandparents passed he got it. It was really well taken care of and very clean inside of it. I got all of the records they ever had with it and they (even though most of the selections were kind of dreadful) were all like new. Looks like they stopped buying records in the mid 30's except for some 50's Christmas music.

[Henry]

I've been looking for the opportunity to share these with the group. From the November 1926 issue of "National Geographic." Enjoy!

[EarlH]

This one is the PR-148C which is a little earlier style but same components. I refinished this one earlier this summer at the same time, but I haven't put the chassis and parts back in it yet. It's a really nice looking machine as well. It was $100 more than the one on short legs. Probably because this one has more going on with the veneer in the case. The finish is a little more artistic on it as well. They are both big and heavy!

[Springmotor70]

Henry - thanks for posting the Ads! - I have many from National Geographic. At the same period Brusnwick took large full page in the Saturday Evening Post and full page as well as centerfold in the Etude music magazine.

Earl - WOW I am impressed with the sprayed highligting - you've certain recaptured the original finish!
the 148-C is a great machine! - and was quite expensive.

If you look closely at the volume knob on my P-11 you'll notice that its actually not the original - like so many the 5 stop potted volume had some bad coils. It was removed but I left it intact for posterity. The volume plate in there is salvaged from another machine with a contemporary control and a period knob.

A couple years ago at Union I bought a P-3 at Union from Bob Coon. I was shocked when I saw it. A family had put it in storage in 1930 and the finish survived amazingly well until Bob found it. It recieved only minor electronic restoration and other than a new grill cloth it needed nothing but a good cleaning. Its in the Georgian Deluxe Case. The case was designed for an acoustic machine with electric turntable. The interior motor board even had a second needle cup opening that was filled at Brusnwick and the volume control covers the majority of it. I really like the slider door which covers the turntable to block surface noise whereas closing the exterior door would also block the speaker or originally the horn...

[EarlH]

You know, I've seen that Ad before that Henry posted and it wasn't until now that I realized there is that typo in it saying it's a 48-C instead of 148-C. I've seen that ad before and though that it must be another model that Brunswick used for that case. But Brunswick did so many odd things with their cabinets that it can be very confusing. I know of one called "Hampton" that's an electric cabinet that Brunswick turned into a spring wound machine to get it out the door. And they put something over an opening on the side of the cabinet that would have been used if it had been an electric type instead of acoustic. It also has a really odd arrangement inside for the record album boxes and horn. So that nicely preserved machine of yours is not really a total surprise. It really is well kept. I ran into a Radiola 67 that was more or less the same thing. I pretty much refinish everything, but that Radiola is really nice like your P-3. That P-3 is really a nice machine but I'll bet it's fun to change needles and records in. Does it have a radio in there? When I was trying to find information on that 148-C I did have a couple of guys tell me that I was lucky mine had the volume control I did as the earlier one often times has problems.
I've been in that argument many times about not refinishing anything, but if you learn how to do it (and take the time to do it) you can do a nice job of it and it will be good again for another 50-75 years with a little bit of care. Maybe even longer, but lacquer oxidizes over time and gets really brittle. It also fades or darkens depending on what it's been exposed to, and it also loses it's clarity so the wood grain becomes almost impossible to see. Plus, the reds in those days faded badly so most of that stuff is blacker looking now so it makes it really difficult to try and match the old finish, so in the end it's just easier to start over. The finish that was still in decent shape on the inside of that one on short legs was almost black and the outside was faded really badly from being in a bright room for years. The left side was nearest to a window and was bleached about white. The 148-C, up on the tall legs was more or less the same thing if not worse. It must have been in a sun room as badly as it was faded. You can see in the photo how badly it was faded. It's not perfect now, but I think most collectors spouses could live with it now. Ha!

[EarlH]

Did you see this on ebay? Looks a lot like your electric machine! Brunswick sure made use of everything they made, that's for sure.