Cylinder: most used or important revolution speeds?

[Marco Gilardetti]

With some search I came up with the following data:

60 RPM - Early experiments on tinfoil
90 RPM - Wax cylinders with spoken material
120 RPM - most XIX century cylinders
160 RPM - XX century cylinders (definitive standard)

Does anyone perhaps know of any (worth mentioning) brand / make that used consistently other rotational speeds than the ones above for their products?

Thank you.

[WDC]

Some known speeds can be:

Edison Brown Wax
pre-1900: 125rpm
post-1900: 144rpm

Columbia Brown Wax
pre-1900: 120rpm
pre late 1902: 140rpm
post-1902: 160rpm, some even 180rpm

US Phonograph Co. (Brown Wax): 120rpm

Lambert
early pink: 120rpm
later pink: 140-160rpm
brown, black: 160rpm
lanuage course (black): 100rpm

Black Wax
Edison, Columbia, and most other brands: 160rpm
Sterling: 140-160rpm
Pathé: 120-160rpm

These values are just a rule of thumb. There are many, many variations. My oldest cylinder from 1892 runs at 132rpm while another late 1890's Columbia orchestra recording goes at 110rpm.
And then there are home recordings too, where I - so far - had anything from as low as 77rpm all the way up to 200rpm. Early Edison studio recordings from 1890 did vary at 110-140rpm, some again at perfect 125rpm in between.
Especially Blue Amberols all the way down the 3000's series are sometimes way off standard speed. And it gets worse with the 5000s where you can find anything between 150-165rpm.

So, if some assumed standard speed sounds wrong to you, it probably is.

Glenn Sage has a some notes on this issue too: http://www.tinfoil.com/trc-do.htm#speed

[tinovanderzwan]

the speed of the early brown wax cylinders was by no means standard
early Pathé brown wax can go as low as 80 rpm most french brands of the 1890s hover somwhere between 80 and 100 rpm
the euro public was more interested in classical music and opera than music hall(vaudeville) and cabaret you could do 2 things to get a classical piece onto cylinder cut the piece down to fit 2 min of playing time or slow the speed down to win extra playing time
there was a 3rd option and that was to speed up the composition i have a 1898 berliner disc with boccherini's minuet played at lightning speed to fit the disc listening to it and nearly wetting myself with laughter i thought this is boccherini's polka!

[Starkton]

With some search I came up with the following data:

60 RPM - Early experiments on tinfoil

That can only be a wild guess! In February 1878 Edison determined the right speed to about 120 rpm.

Another source of April 1878 mentions 40 and 50 rpm.