Accessory collectors?

[gramophoneshane]

I know a lot of us collect accessories that were available for our acoustic machines like needle tins, dusters etc, but John M's recent thread on the pick-up for the 7-26 got me wondering if anyone here also collects electric accessories for acoustic machines too, such as pick-ups that fit acoustic tonearm, replacement arms to suit these separate pick-ups, and complete replacement arms that include a pick-up.
I've been collecting them pretty much since I started collecting acoustic machines, because I find them interesting & also relevant as a legitamate accessory for acoustic machines.
Generally speaking, they can sound great, even through a modern home theatre system, those with magnetic cartridges are usually easy to fix, and they can often be bought for very little money.
So I thought I'd post some of what I've acquired over the years, and I'd love see any that fellow board members might have too.

[recordo]

Great Photos, Shane!

I love the HMV pickup (number 25?) in the second last photo. I have that same arm in my 1937 HMV Radiogram, model 721, and what a sound!

[Swing Band Heaven]

Great Photos, Shane!
I have that same arm in my 1937 HMV Radiogram, model 721, and what a sound!

Wow a model 721. Any chance of a pic of the radiogram?

S-B-H

[recordo]

Glad to oblige! I LOVE this machine. Unfortunately some previous clown owner decided to remove the magic eye and short wave coils, but as I mainly play 78s, that's not a great problem. I have a spare chassis and will one day get around to putting the missing parts back onto this one, but it is a real PITA to pull this machine apart. :)

Max's aria from Der Freischutz (Weber) sung by Richard Tauber, I think his best classical recording...
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ItDumDT7OBo[/youtube]

Artransa 78 of Bobby Limb and his Cabaret band (Australian) featuring vocalist Kathy Lloyd:
[YouTube] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B1J0NNVq7wc[/YouTube]

My good friend and colleague, Enzo Toppano, recorded this side in 1944. Enzo's still going strong. I recently re-mastered all his recordings for him, it was a thrill to hold the master copies of disks I'd read about since I was a child on the back of HMV covers!
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Btv_7znN_c[/youtube]

[Swing Band Heaven]

Very interesting thanks for the youtube link and photo. It really is a hansome machine and towards the upper part of the line? I see you have a 163 lurking there in your collection too. A good re-enterant machine with a good sound. Not as good as the 203 but we have to wait for Shane to get bored of his and want to sell it

I have seen a similar machine to yours when I visited a collector who used to live near me. I am sure it was the same model but its pick up was different. It had a very large counterbalance on the back of the pickup and was featherlight! I've never seen anything quite like it before and it was factory fitted and contemporary to the machine. I had no idea that HMV produced such pick ups in the late 1930's.

[Henry]

Max's aria from Der Freischutz (Weber) sung by Richard Tauber, I think his best classical recording...

Ah, Freischütz! The true progenitor of German Romantic opera (with apologies to Fidelio). Rarely done, even in NYC, where I saw it in the 1980s at City Opera. It should be performed much more often. All the elements are there: the mythic, the supernatural, Nature (malevolent) as a character, evil personified, good ultimately triumphant, and so on and so on. A favorite of Berlioz; Wagner's music heavily indebted to Carl Maria von Weber, truly one of the most underrated and neglected composers.Terrific performance here; many thanks for posting!

[gramophoneshane]

That is one nice HMV radiogram you've got there, and it does indeed sound fantastic!
IMO, it took until the mid 30s for electrical reproduction to equal & exceed the sound quality of the big Re-entrants.

I'm pretty sure your pick-up arm is the No.25, but I've never owned one myself.
The HMV box in my photo is for the No.2200, which was NOS when I got it. The 2200 is now used on my Garrard 301. It employs a single coil, and the main visual difference between the 2200 & 25 is that the 25 has a brake lever arm attached to the base. Never having owned a no.25, I'm not sure if these were a single or double coil pick-up though. Perhaps you know?
The arm on the front left is a Marconiphone, which uses the double coil system, and the one on the right is a Columbia No.26 from the box pictured. It still has the original sealing medium over the screws, so I've never opened to check if single or double coils are used.
These of course were all manufactured by EMI, and are identical in appearence apart from the logo on the top of the pick-up shell.
The pick-up arm sitting on top of the 2 boxes is an HMV arm for use with their "silent stylus", but I have no idea what model number the arm was given.

[recordo]

Hi Shane,

I had to pull apart the arm to replace the rock hard rubber - single coil inside although there was a second non original coil just sitting on top of the magnet. I took it out as it wasn't even connected to anything. This poor machine had really been butchered previously...

Mine originally had the brake arm connected to the base but I had to take it off as it kept scraping on the wood and it wasn't operating the electrical brake and switch setup as that had been removed years ago when the micro switch failed. The motor has a simple on/off switch now at the 12.00 o'clock position.

I'm going to find an HMV cover and post it of the advertising for these arms - I love those covers.

Regards, G.

[recordo]

My favourite HMV cover with the number 25 pickup. I've never seen a number 11 as featured on the bottom.

[gramophoneshane]

The pick-up head on the left in the first photo is a no.11, but kind of looks more like a lump of coal lol. Here's a couple better pix.

The second coil in your pick-up may have been original but disconnected if it looked like the Marconi below. I read a theory somewhere the second coil was wound in the opposite directing & was meant to cancel out any AC hum in the pick-up from the magnetic field of the motor, but whether that's right or not I dont know.