The Talking Machine Forum — For All Antique Phonographs & Recordings

I quite like buying phonographs that would otherwise be parts machines and bringing them back to life, I spotted this one on Ebay and thought I'd give it a second chance at life, Columbia Cylinder machines seem to turn up rarely in the UK, especially the larger ornate ones such as this, so I couldn't help myself.

It's a coumbia AT in very sorry condition, the bedplate and trunion are pot metal, the trunion has distorted and cracked heavily then froze itself to the rod so much so the only way to get it off was to shatter it with a hammer, the bedplate had also heavily distorted and become very fragile so it broke in shipping and broke in several more pieces trying to get it removed, those will obviously need replaced, along with a reproducer and winding handle.
It's going to be one of those machines where the amount put into it will be higher than the value of the machine, but I love these kind of projects.

There are a couple of plus points, the case looks very nice, original decal is in nice shape, there is a splinter of wood missing around the back and some water damage on the lid but nothing majorly taking away from it, and the motor is present, complete and seems to even be running, although it's very stiff and the governor weights may need replacing in time, I wound it up with the winding handle from my edison standard which just about works and it ran for some time, so I believe the springs are in decent shape, I hope anyway!

The only problem now is the nut holding the pulley to the mandrel shaft and thus the whole mandrel to the casting is very stuck, so I'm working at getting that freed up without destroying it

Time to start selling things to afford parts!
Oh, and this used to be a carriage assembly

FYI, in case you don't know, the nut holding the pulley to the mandrel shaft has a left - hand thread. Since discovering that, I haven't had any problem with them.

JIM

Yeah Jerry B said already, I felt quite the fool

I think I have your twin machine I will restore it in the next months!

Regards,

Pedro Martínez

Seems so, just my bed plate is in quite a few more pieces

I've already found a bedplate made out of iron!

Fortunately so have I, should be running before too long

Alex,
You need to keep in touch with Pedro, as he restores his machine. To my knowledge, there is no current source for replacement pot metal parts on a Columbia AT, but I may be wrong. Glad you both found cast iron bedplates...

Whatever Pedro comes up with will be what you need to replace the trunnion and carriage parts and he may be able to make some extras. Someone really needs to make some billet aluminum replacement parts for these machines, as there are many out there with those same problems and they are a really attractive machine otherwise.

Curt

Alex,
I got good replacement parts (including trunion) for my AT from Jean-Paul Agnard in Quebec.
Regards,
Alistair.

Pity these otherwise fine machines have this pot metal garbage. I wonder why they used that junk at all.

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Bobby