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I'm getting frustrated with my Edison Opera and would sincerely appreciate some input from any members here who own an Edison Opera or have owned one and are familiar with the drivetrain.

I just cannot seem to figure out why it plays with a mild flutter.

It bugs me a great deal as I know this phonograph is capable of playing perfectly with nice smooth, natural sound.

This is a completely original Edison Opera. No reproduction parts...no messing around with it by a previous owner. Nothing has been cobbled or tampered with.

Here is what I have tried with very little improvement:

1. I have removed the governor and cleaned it thoroughly. The weights are all exactly the same and in excellent condition. The governor springs are in excellent condition. The worm gear had quite a lot of black gunk in the 'spirals' that I carefully removed so it looks great now. The speed control pads and yoke are fine. The brass friction disc looks fine with no discernible wobble at all - it spins nice and straight. The shaft that the governor weight assembly slides laterally on during rapid governor rotation is fine. The ends of the governor that spin inside their respective sleeve bearings are fine. The governor itself spins freely with absolutely no wavering at any speed.

2. The brass helical gear that meshes with the governor worm gear looks great although it has discolored (to black) from years of lubrication that has dried on its surface. The gear teeth are uniform and appear to be in fine condition. I cleaned this gear with a toothbrush and mineral spirits.

3. I have lubricated the drivetrain gears, telescoping shaft, feedscrew, carriage, etc.

4. The flywheel is in excellent condition. Both screws are present in the flywheel and both are correctly attached to the mandrel shaft through their respective flywheel holes. I have tried at least two different balance wires in the flywheel: .020 and .025. I realize that original equipment was a .022 spring wire but I don't have that size and don't know whether it would resolve the slight flutter issue I hear.

The motor and drivetrain run perfectly quiet and smooth. The reproducer is in excellent playing condition. The mandrel spins perfectly true and smoothly.

I'm incredibly frustrated at this point as to the cause of the flutter.

With exception of the flywheel which I have removed and cleaned, I'm reluctant to disassemble the remaining mandrel shaft drivetrain components unless the consensus of opinion is that the culprit of the flutter may lie therein.

I am hoping to post a video of the sound as I hear it with hopes that some of you may hear what I hear and have some ideas beyond what I have already tried.

Until I get a chance to post a video, if anyone has any input as to what might be causing the slight flutter during playback please share it with me.

I'm willing to try almost anything to get this wonderful phonograph playing as it should again.

Many thanks, in advance, for your input!

Doug

PS. Below is a video I found on YouTube of someone else's Edison Opera that has an annoying flutter during play. The flutter on mine is not quite as bad is this one but it is still present and it bugs me. Hope someone can help!

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=crkdQM0kBs0[/youtube]

I've seen the flywheel wire installed incorrectly, with its ends sticking out & the retaining ring JAMMED down against them. It should be just long enough to reach the surface of the groove, with the retaining ring sitting on top of it.


ps - I replaced my broken Amberola V spring with a piece cut from a spare throttle return spring; it works very nicely.

Thanks for your input Edisone. I'm pretty confident that I have the current .020 flywheel balance wire installed correctly but that is very useful information.

For what it's worth, in my attempts to resolve the flutter issue I have even tried swapping the governor (in good functioning condition!) from a complete Amberola 1B motor and drivetrain which I've had for years in storage. It has the same exact drivetrain (including governor) as an Edison Opera.

No difference relative to the flutter.

Doggone it...frustrated again. But this would seem to indicate that my Edison Opera governor is fine or BOTH governors have flutter issues (unlikely).

The next thing I will try is swapping the Flywheels from the 1B drivetrain with the Opera flywheel. If the condition still exists after swapping flywheels then...ummmmm....yeah....I'm still at square one.

What's weird about this whole flutter mystery I'm having with my Opera is that every time I think I have the issue solved by making some sort of change, when I start it up I'm thinking to myself "this isn't going to work....I know I will hear the flutter." And, sure enough, there it is...laughing at me.

It's a real mystery. Please keep the ideas coming!

Thanks,
Doug

If your 1B is running nicely, I'd suggest taking a very close look at how its governor friction disc is positioned in relation to the governor felt pads in both running and rest positions (not with the stop brake on, though). How do the appearance and shape of your governor pads on your Opera compare to the 1B?
The speed adjustment range should be set so the felt pads aren't positioned in either extreme of slow or fast revolutions when the motor's running at 160 rpms. Loosen the two tiny screws on the speed indicator so it doesn't interfere with any adjustments of the speed control.

Have you removed the governor weights and springs and checked their individual weight on a digital scale?
Even if the weights are close enough, it's my belief that the leaf springs can develop some metal fatigue, and you might benefit replacing them with a new set from Ron Sitko.
My machines have a surprising amount of play in the governor bearings, but they run very happily that way.
Of course, let the motor wind down completely if you do any adjustment of the governor bearings!
Feel free to pm me if you want. This needs to get fixed!
Bob

barnettrp21122 wrote:If your 1B is running nicely, I'd suggest taking a very close look at how its governor friction disc is positioned in relation to the governor felt pads in both running and rest positions (not with the stop brake on, though). How do the appearance and shape of your governor pads on your Opera compare to the 1B?
The speed adjustment range should be set so the felt pads aren't positioned in either extreme of slow or fast revolutions when the motor's running at 160 rpms. Loosen the two tiny screws on the speed indicator so it doesn't interfere with any adjustments of the speed control.

Have you removed the governor weights and springs and checked their individual weight on a digital scale?
Even if the weights are close enough, it's my belief that the leaf springs can develop some metal fatigue, and you might benefit replacing them with a new set from Ron Sitko.
My machines have a surprising amount of play in the governor bearings, but they run very happily that way.
Of course, let the motor wind down completely if you do any adjustment of the governor bearings!
Feel free to pm me if you want. This needs to get fixed!
Bob

Thanks for your input, Bob. The governor pads are not equally shaped on my Opera. And, the yoke that holds the pads is still pretty sticky likely from built up gunk. I tried putting Zoom Spout oil on the yoke but it freed up only a little.

I do notice that the brass friction disc surface looks like it has extremely light 'spin grooves' in it but this is barely perceptible visually. As mentioned earlier, the friction disc appears to spin very true.

Also, the governor has no play whatsoever on my Opera. Unlike earlier Edison cylinder phonographs that actually require some lateral governor play, I presumed that there should be no lateral governor play on the Opera to operate properly.

When I move the speed control dial on either the Opera or the Amberola 1B works I see no movement of the speed control yoke! I can't see how moving the speed dial depresses the spring loaded adjustment lever.

I will send you a PM offline to discuss further. Thanks again Bob.

Doug

Here are a couple more ideas for you to think about:

A long time ago I was having trouble getting the last of the flutter out of my Edison Standard Model D combination
2 and 4 minute machine.

As found, it had one of the later designs of governors
which has the little collar with the fine length of
steel wire straight spring that acts as a damper of sorts.

Swapped that entire governor out with an earlier one which has no such damper. Big improvement but still not perfect.

Then I was running the machine one time with the
bottom works propped up opened up with hinged base plate
held by the catch on the left side.

As the machine was running at 160 rpm I took a sharp
red colored pencil and very gradually moved it toward
the center of the spinning weights until I heard it
gently rubbing up against them just barely a tiny bit.

Then I took the pencil away, stopped the machine, and looked at the weights.
Only two of them had fragments of red pencil lead on
them. The third one was clean. So I very gently bent
that one out just a very tiny bit and repeated the test.
Now only one weight got the mark.

Next thing was to gently bend that one back down very
slightly. I did this for many tests until they all 3
mark evenly every time. That machine has been completely free of any flutter ever since.

Never did put back the later design governor which has the damper spring.

There's a couple of ideas. Hope maybe this might help
some.

Chuck

I've always used music wire to replace that piece of wire that get broken in those Opera's and never had any trouble with them after that. If it's not tempered or whatever it is they do with music wire, it doesn't seem to do the job correctly.

Before I share 'the rest of the story' on my Edison Opera here I would like to express my sincere appreciation to those who offered their advice and help with my Edison Opera flutter issue.

I would like to publicly thank Bob (barnettrp21122 here on the Forum) who graciously sent pictures of various parts on his beautiful Edison Opera so that I could compare the settings and so forth on his Opera with mine. Bob also provided some extremely useful information through email messages as well as by telephone to help me wade through the rather complex drivetrain of the Edison Opera.

I've gotten myself knee deep in making adjustments and repairs to the early disc music boxes in my collection as well as tweeking some of the phonographs in my collection over the years. But, I've never fiddled with an Edison Opera nor have I ever had to.

Anyway, I'm pleased to inform everyone that I have finally been successful in making the necessary adjustments to my Opera so that it now meets my critical expectations for playing. That is, perfectly smooth and natural - exactly as an Edison Opera should play.

I intensely dislike listening to any sort of flutter or warble in any of the machines in my collection. Unlike most Edison cylinder phonographs, the Edison Opera has lots of bells and whistles built in to produce that incredible sound that makes the Opera a very desireable phonograph. As a result, making adjustments can be tedious, frustrating and even a bit daunting to get them to play perfectly smooth and natural which is the only result I will accept.

Thankfully, I have a complete Edison Amberola 1B that I could swap parts with on the Opera to help isolate the issue.

The first thought was that the governor was the culprit. So I removed and cleaned all of the moving parts on the governor, reinstalled it and...no difference. (ugh!)
I then decided the rather complex speed control assembly may be at fault so I cleaned and lubed that...still no difference.

I knew that the weighted flywheel was installed correctly but I had used a .020 gauge wire instead of the factory installed .022 spring wire in the flywheel simply because that is the closest gauge wire I could find. Could that be the problem? I thought not since the difference in size is minimal.

What I then decided to do was to install the good functioning Amberola 1B governor into the Opera...still no difference! What the heck is going on here?

Nothing seemed to make that annoying flutter go away. I was beginning to resign myself to the fact that I was not going to be able to remove the flutter. I was even waking up in the middle of the night trying to figure out what in the world could be causing the problem.

The entire motor and drivetrain are running whisper quiet. Yet I still have the annoying flutter. Could it be the springs? Maybe a worn gear? Maybe a slightly bent shaft? Maybe a gunked up part that I cannot see? None of this made sense but then any of them could be the culprit.

I was ready to give up. I called Bob B. and explained everything I had tried and that nothing seemed to make any difference.

It was then that we both agreed that the issue may not be with the governor at all. We decided it was best to next try removing the balance wire from the flywheel and try playing a cylinder to see if it made any difference. It made no discernible difference at all.

But! Before I reinstalled the wire back into the flywheel I remembered something that Bob and I discussed relative to the balance wire in the flywheel. Bob had mentioned, "the wire needs to be fairly flexible and if it's not then it may not be doing its job correctly".

Sooooo.......I decided to take a few minutes and bend the balance wire every which way I could so that it was more flexible than it had been. I then reinstalled the balance wire into the flywheel and mounted one of 3 of my test cylinders: early flat ended Blue Amberol cylinders that provide crisp clear sound. The one I selected was #1650, Menuett – Gavotte by the Tollefsen Trio – an incredibly boring cylinder but great for noticing flutter!

After it started playing I almost fell on the floor with astonishment.

What? Huh? Is it possible? It can’t be? The flutter was gone. I played the cylinder again putting my head right inside the mahogany horn.

Yup. Gone. Who would have thunk it? All those hours and effort spent on the governor when it was that crazy little flywheel balance wire all along. Yippee!

I tried playing my other test cylinders: #1634, Kiss Me My Honey Kiss Me and #1509, La Paloma. No more flutter. In spite of all of the frustrating hours spent on this experience I must admit that I learned a LOT about the Edison Opera drivetrain as a result.

And, once again, after reaching out for help on this Forum I was thankfully rewarded. I’m truly humbled by those who have helped me here and I can only hope that I may return the gift sometime.

For what it’s worth, this is the second Edison Opera that I’ve added to my collection. My first Edison Opera still plays great (seen on my YouTube channel here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JF3aYPTy0Js ). I’ve never had any issues with that one so I didn’t want to disturb anything on it by swapping parts.

Thankfully, the parts from the Amberola 1B were useful to help with the issue on this particular Opera. It sure is helpful to have a similar phonograph to refer to when another one has a problem!

Again, my sincere thanks to those who offered their thoughtful ideas and help. I’m hoping to soon receive the correct .022 flywheel spring wire from Wyatt so that I can replace the .020 wire that I now have installed in this Opera. Hopefully, my experience will assist others with similar issues with their Opera (or Amberola 1B / III).

Doug

I really like this story!
During our phone discussions, I mentioned to Doug how I often get fixated on one part of any phono mechanism problem, as with the motor governor, and sometimes have to step back and look at other possibilities, even if covered before. I'm glad the fix was a good and final one!
The episode inspired me to record and post a nice Blue Amberol selection from a cylinder I picked up at last weekend's Wayne show. Hope you check it out!

http://forum.talkingmachine.info/viewto ... =3&t=21293

Always enjoy the music!
Bob