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Can anyone identify this oak cabinet?
Posted: Tue Apr 05, 2016 12:30 pm
by phono-farm
This recent Craigslist find is missing the original mechanism and was poorly retrofitted with a Graphophone 3-spring motor and pot-metal tonearm. There is no name anywhere on the cabinet, but I'd like to know what it is. It has a very large round wood horn behind the grill. Note that the Graphophone mechanism has a built-in speed control, and the original speed control is also still in the cabinet too.
Re: Can anyone identify this oak cabinet?
Posted: Tue Apr 05, 2016 1:05 pm
by emerson
Any chance of a picture of the horn and how the grill is held in?
Re: Can anyone identify this oak cabinet?
Posted: Tue Apr 05, 2016 1:13 pm
by startgroove
Looks like the original tone arm is still there. Have you looked on the reproducer for a name? The speed control looks identical to the one on my Pathé.
Re: Can anyone identify this oak cabinet?
Posted: Tue Apr 05, 2016 1:31 pm
by estott
Re: Can anyone identify this oak cabinet?
Posted: Tue Apr 05, 2016 3:05 pm
by phono-farm
I'm pretty sure the tone arm is replaced since they roughly cut off part of the metal base of it to fit around the needle cup and then fastened it down with Phillips head drywall screws. No ID anywhere on the reproducer. The horn is wood as can be seen looking at the outside of it, but is white on the inside of it. The grill lifts up, then you pull it forward at the bottom and let it drop out of the upper slot, like most Edison grills. Also, whatever record storage shelving may have been inside the lower doors is gone and replaced with little shelves possibly to hold CDs.
Re: Can anyone identify this oak cabinet?
Posted: Tue Apr 05, 2016 4:37 pm
by De Soto Frank
The rim of the horn looks like it might be plaster...
It's a shame this machine got klodged-up.

Re: Can anyone identify this oak cabinet?
Posted: Tue Apr 05, 2016 6:19 pm
by emerson
I am guessing that when the original Emerson Company went to different hands, there were others companies buying the cabinets and creating their own ventures into the Phonograph Industry. Mello Phonic was one such company that used the plaster horn.
Re: Can anyone identify this oak cabinet?
Posted: Tue Apr 05, 2016 8:00 pm
by edisonrestorer64
I believe this is a Columbia model
Re: Can anyone identify this oak cabinet?
Posted: Tue Apr 05, 2016 8:43 pm
by phono-farm
Since it had the Graphophone motor, the first thing I did was look through the Columbia Phonograph Companion, vol. 2, at their disk phonographs. I didn't see anything remotely close to this, and they all had Columbia's patented louvers over the grill to control volume. The motor and tonearm are not original for this cabinet. Did Columbia make cabinets like this without louvres?
Re: Can anyone identify this oak cabinet?
Posted: Tue Apr 05, 2016 11:39 pm
by De Soto Frank
This cabinet does not closely resemble any Columbia cabinet I am familiar with.
I don't recall anything like it in Baumbach & Lackey's Columbia Disc Phonograph Companion.