The Talking Machine Forum — For All Antique Phonographs & Recordings

Hello!
I have been meaning to ask this for a while. What should one do with his 100 pound box of used phonograph needles? Has anyone found any creative uses for old phonograph needles? I am sure many collectors on this forum go through hundreds of phonograph needles every month and throw them away. The only use I can think of is using them as headless nails. Any ideas?

Thanks

Well, you could always take up etching; but that wouldn't use very many of them......

Maybe you could use them as hitchpins on zithers - or for homemade pachinko boards?

Wow that's a lot of needles. I did the math and that would be somewhere in the ballpark of 432,000 needles! If you started with the first needle and listen to a record, changed the needle and continued the process, you would be listening to records nonstop for 2.46 years to reach 100 lbs of needles. My vote is to hold onto them and call the Guinness Book to try for a record. (Sorry for the bad humor) : )

Dang!
A hundred pounds of scrap steel is bound to be worth something. (But only if somebody else is doing the lifting .)

How about building a toothpick, er a steel needle, model replica of the Nipper building in Camden. Depending the number of needles required, you could replicate the whole complex from the height of the VTM production.

I pin them through the wicks on my citronella candles so the wick doesn't pull through the top when I am refilling them with oil. Skeeters are bad here in South Jersey!
Cheers!

Actually, if you have a rock tumbler [used for polishing agates and such], you can put them in it with some small ball bearings and powdered pumice stone [and oil] and run it for several days. This will make useable needles out of them again , because that is how they were pointed when they were new-----just on a bigger scale.