The Talking Machine Forum — For All Antique Phonographs & Recordings

I have a lot of parts that I will soon send out to be nickel plated, some of which are mandrels. I'm wondering if the thickness added with nickel plating could cause problems with fitting cylinders. Has anyone done this, and has it caused any notable thickness at all?

Thanks
Martin

Nickel plating goes on pretty thin, Martin; I doubt sincerely that you will have any problems. Ordinarily there should be enough loose tolerance that you will be able to fit even slightly shrunken or slightly overbored records on to play them, so nickeling shouldn't hurt it.

Hope it comes out looking as good as your other restorations--which have been pretty nice!

The only trouble I have had with re-plating mandrels is the pulley end. The ones made of pot metal were not always plated and the appearance suffers a little when they are left on the mandrel for the re-plating process. I usually remove them and send out only the tapered part and re-assemble after. Those end pulleys usually come out easy enough as they are merely pressed in. On re-assembly, the inside of the mandrel end needs to be cleaned out. Alternately, that end could be masked off to prevent unwanted deposits and plating from affecting the dimensionality. Cheers, Russie