New needles for my old phonograph have arrived lets see how it sounds

My 100 year old phonograph has new needles now.
I didn't show the speed, but with my RPM speed app I can set it to exactly 78 with only 0.15% wow and flutter. Not bad for such an old piece.

[@Sans_Solo_]

It's amazing those primitive needles track into the grooves without destroying the record material....Glad you got it up and running!

[@12voltvids]

The needle is very soft steel and wears out quickly. 1 needle is good for only a couple of plays. I have a few 78s. About 20 I cherish as they were my grandmother's and mother's. Benny Goodman, Bing Crosby ect. The opera records can go but the jazz and big band those are right up my alley.

[@Tobinindustrial]

I just learned something about the old record players. You got to love record players especially the good quality ones. I lost my brother's record collection and record players in a shed fire. He left his collection to me and my neighbor was burning grass one day and burned my shed down. It was a huge collection so I had to store it in the shed. Everytime I see a video like this I get a bit of a heavy heart. Thanks for sharing. Happy New Year.

[@grizzlyaddams3606]

Sorry for your loss.

[@12voltvids]

I don't have a huge record collection, perhaps 400 albums and a few hundred 45 singles and hand full of 78s. I made the transition to cd early and have probably 1000 CDs.

[@Tobinindustrial]

@@12voltvids The collection I had from my brother entailed many milk crates full and was certainly well over a truck load. He had a gramaphone plus a few older record players and a couple of high quality ones. I really miss listening to music on a quality record player. CD's are great but records are still magical.

[@highpath4776]

@@Tobinindustrial Most older records, with time, can be replaced, sometimes cheaply, sometimes at great cost.

[@Tobinindustrial]

@@highpath4776 So true. I live in rural Newfoundland so records are not readily availailable in the scarce yard sales, etc... I would love to have a good record player and then I'd have courage to search for some records. I regret not having the space to have a record player set up and some of my favorite records nearby. everything was stored in a shed. I now have a bit of space but I at at net zero with a player and records. I think I have one record in my house. It is Simon and Garfunkel's greatest hits album.

[@Musicradio77Network]

I have three of them, including my recent one of 2021 was the Sonora tabletop model which is the Barcarolle. It has a tonearm with a reproducer and it was adjustable for playing both lateral and vertical records and it still plays pretty darn good.

[@fadhlematrook1248]

YHAT CAT MAKE THIS VIDEO COMPATIBLE WITH OLD EQUEPMENT >>

[@426hemicuda1090]

wow!!! the sound is so harsh..... we are so spoiled now days

[@highpath4776]

he was playing with the loudest needle,

[@vrvretro]

I didn't know about the vertical cut products but when you showed the blank side I realized that I've seen them before. I have a small collection of 78's and the Edisons are about the thickness of 3 regular 78's. I'm in the US so I hope someone in Canada can forward you an Edison disc, it would be prohibitively expensive to mail, and probably break anyway. My collection includes Mel Blanc, and the zither instrumental The Third Man theme. My Dual 1218 has 78rpm and it's been quite a while since I've played them.

[@12voltvids]

Yes diamond disks are about 1/4" thick. There are a few of them on Craigslist but owners are on drugs. Asking 100 to 250 for 1 disk. I even responded to one. I said i would take the 1.00 one. Got a response that it was 100 not 1.00.

[@highpath4776]

By 1949 most USA labels were making 78s and 45s of the same tracks, there may be some audio differences when listening , depending on your preference. In the UK until the mid 1950s some labels were only issuing tracks on 78s that never made it to a 45 release.

[@gunnarthefeisty]

Edison's are ridiculously thick and can be shipped easily.

[@EastAngliaUK]

it sounds pretty loud surprised the cats did not go.

[@12voltvids]

Yes it is loud.

[@Aeduo]

At first i thought that second record was going to be the trololo song but i was disappointed. I think that song is a lot newer anyway.

[@12voltvids]

I was digging through my 78s that i inherited and I have some classics. Bing Crosby white Christmas on 78, Frank Sinatra, Benny Goodman ect. Doesn't sound bad at all on this. Of course my modified record player (black plastic crap no more) video with the mono ceramic cartridge sounds much better for the modern recordings.

[@martinda7446]

Fascinating. Edison patented the Phonograph, which was his cylinder machine and Berliner patented his Gramophone which was the disc playing machine. This is Edisons version of the Gramophone... Did he still call it a Phonograph?? Vertical modulation was called 'hill and dale and shouldn't have trouble being reproduced by any mechanical transducer as long as the vertical compliance is high enough. Modern 45/45 stereo patented by Blumlein in the 30s.

[@gunnarthefeisty]

In america, Edison's machines were indeed called phonographs.

[@fkthewhat]

This is very different to the cantilever and crystal design I’m used to…!

[@FoulOwl2112]

Wow you've got a Siamese too! So do l. It's name is Gert. Sleeps with me every night and is a great alarm clock. Wakes me up promptly at 5am puking in my doorway.

[@12voltvids]

A few of my cats made a cameo in this one. The Siamese a half Siamese tabby and a big ragdoll.

[@FoulOwl2112]

@@12voltvids Yeah l doubt Gert's 100% Siamese either. Just appeared under my workshop and adopted us. So after a short get-to-know-ya period, it was off to the vet, into the house and added to the menagerie...

[@12voltvids]

@@FoulOwl2112 my Siamese is purebread. My daughter paid a small fortune for her. The parents are grand national show champions. Then the daughter moved out and left me the cat.

[@alex1520]

cute cat! :D is that the one that likes eating tape? lol I see a second cat in the mirror reflection. Or is it the other one.

[@eDoc2020]

I saw three cats in the video.

[@peterferguson2344]

The cat clearly approves 😸👍

[@12voltvids]

Cat wants some fish food. Yes this silly thing eats fish pellets. (they are made from salmon, cod, 🐟, 🦐, 🦀.

[@anukanaka3568]

Тоже хочу такой аппарат ! :)

[@johnhoward1565]

it would be nice if you showed how to change the needle's

[@12voltvids]

Really nothing to see. A thumb screw is loosened and the needle exchanged and the thumb screw tightened.

[@MartinSBrown-tp9ji]

Edison was asked what was his favorite invention. He said the phonograph because never before was sound able to be heard or recorded to hear more than once. (there is a first for everything)

[@12voltvids]

I agree that the phonograph was his most important invention. Who needs electric lightbulbs anyway right.

[@MartinSBrown-tp9ji]

@@12voltvids Edison said it was his favorite not his most important invention. You rant to much on your videos and make them to long.

[@12voltvids]

@@MartinSBrown-tp9ji that was a joke by the way. Who needs record players if you can't see them in the dark to use them.

[@africanlights4559]

HI I HAVE OLD TV ECCO IS NOT SWITCHING ON WHAT SHOULD I DO First , how to show I test circuit board

[@12voltvids]

Couldn't tell you because i don't know what an ecco tv is.

[@larryshaver3568]

I've has Siamese too they're a sketch

[@crashbandicoot4everr]

I recently got my hands on a Soviet grammophone, suitcase style. I measured the speed and it's 79 RPM at the lowest setting. Is that normal?

[@highpath4776]

Many records will run 78 to 80 rpm , it might sound a touch fast but 1/78th extra you probably wont notice the difference. Normally you would expect it to run slow, you say setting , maybe the spring has been replaced at some time.

[@crashbandicoot4everr]

@@highpath4776 Makes sense. The Edison Diamond discs were 80 RPM.

[@Stelios.Posantzis]

Nice find this gramophone and the Edison record. A word of caution: playing vertically cut records with a device made for playing laterally cut records (or vice versa) will of course ruin your records. As for the louder needles, if I were to guess, I'd guess these are made of harder steel and will thus wear records out sooner. Remember that all needles wear out and the material lost from the needle ends up in the record grooves. I would be inclined to think that a fibre/wood (bamboo or other wood) needle does less damage but that may not be strictly true. If you don't clean the record before you replay it, that debris will be caked into the grooves and compacted by subsequent playing. Of course wet cleaning of these records does damage them as they are hygroscopic after all. They also get soft with heat so don't leave them in direct sunlight.

[@12voltvids]

I have 2 pickups for this phonograph. An Edison diamond disk pickup and a universal. The universal will play both vertical and lateral cut grooves by simply rotating the pickup. This is not something i use regularly. The old 78s are far too valuable to play on this. I have a proper Philips tube amp record player with a proper 78 pickup and it sounds great. I don't have a huge number of 78s but the ones i have are pretty good. Big band, Glen Miller, Benny Goodman, Harry James, Boston pops (Arthur fiedler conductor). Perhaps 50 records that were my grandmother's collection.

[@Stelios.Posantzis]

@@12voltvids 78 rpm records are a pretty expensive and possibly frustrating hobby. An electronic turntable is probably a better way to preserve them if you play them often. If I could, I'd just play them once to record them on analogue tape/cassette and then keep them in storage. You'd lose a bit of the immediacy and get some electronic artefacts in the sound but it would preserve the record. I'd love an ELP (who wouldn't) but that still leaves the issue of the dust, dirt and scratches in the record.

[@12voltvids]

@@Stelios.Posantzis i don't collect them. I have a few that were handed down.i don't listen to vinyl much. Everything i have is on a much better sounding digital platform.

[@Stelios.Posantzis]

@@12voltvids 78 rpm collectors are either single or have huge mansions. More seriously though: it depends on how the record was made. For those recorded via an electrical cutter driven by an electrical amplifier, one cannot expect a sound quality that can rival records made on more modern recording systems. For those made on a fully acoustic chain however, word as it they can hold their own in certain respects compared to modern recordings, e.g. in terms of immediacy of sound etc.

[@12voltvids]

@@Stelios.Posantzis i have both acoustic and electronically recorded. The electronic definitely sound better. Yes they do take up alot of space. Fun fact, many record collectors are single because they are record collectors. I have to be very careful on my choice of words here because i never know who is reading this but I do know a collector whom has a huge collection of DVDs. Needless to say he is single now and probably regretting the choice he made a number of years ago. It was me or your dam movie collection. All I can say is he probably has 20,000 DVDs and blurays in his pad.

[@dlarge6502]

According to another channel on KZbin who also looked at phonographs they mentioned that the background hiss you hear, that being the noise of the needle, will be almost eliminated by closing the lid. Does that work on this one also?

[@12voltvids]

The reproducer is a diaphragm that is connected to the needle. Think of it like the cone in a speaker. Your speakers is in a box so the sound from the back of the cone is isolated and contained into the box. This is exactly the same. Sound is emitted from both sides of the diaphram on the reproducer. The side you want to hear is the side feeding into the megaphone. The out of phase sound from the back side just adds noise. So yes closing the lid keeps this noise inside and away from your ears. So yes it does reduce the noise but then the video would be pretty boring as everyone wants to see this dinosaur. Well everyone but johnny shithead that launched complains to KZbin calling it unwanted spam. Guy is a loser. He subscribed and then complains when videos get posted and he is notified.

[@BloodAsp]

I take it this is not a good solution to play records without electricity because the needles wear the groove out significantly more than a regular player? It might get one if it doesn't wear out the disk to play rock with.

[@12voltvids]

Well they claimed that scellac records could be played a couple hundred times. Edison said his diamond disks could be played up to 1000 times. A light weight modern pickup of course will not only sound better but less wear. I won't be playing many records on this more just to show it off. The 78s i care about will be played on the old converted Panasonic player which i think i will mount a speaker in. Perhaps that will be a video project.

[@BloodAsp]

@12voltvids Hmm, I wish there was a way to play ("vinyl") records like this without electric pickups or devices. I wonder if there any equipment today that makes that possible, but with less wear and tear than your machine here. It should be possible to convert a 'vinyl' stylus to an analogue horn, without having heavy arm pressure.

[@highpath4776]

Decent 78 records (including produced in India until about 1965) of the Rock N Roll era sound really great on a player set up like that shown. See other YT vids.

[@DeadKoby]

I enjoy mechanical phono for the technology, but the music styles weren't really to my liking either. The recording technology actually lent itself to the loud military marches and booming opera voices.... so that's what they recorded.

[@johnhpalmer6098]

There were quite a few black, or "race" recordings (the blues mainly), lots of Jazz were also recorded. In fact, many big bands were around during these years and were recorded on 78's. Even Bing Crosby began his career on the old 78's, up through the mid 50's in fact before they became obsolete.

[@12voltvids]

@@johnhpalmer6098 I have some Bing Crosby (have white Christmas on 78) and frank Sinatra on 78 as well as long of swing Benny Goodman. A box of opera but i am trying to get rid of that. It's cool to hear these on the old mechanical unit, but it doesn't have the sound of my other turntable.

[@johnhpalmer6098]

@@12voltvids That's true, the sound. However, Opera, I can understand as it's not my bag either, let alone most classical too. Interesting there are a few vintage tables, similar to this that actually can sound quite decent, though I think you need to move up to the electrified era though (1925 and up). That said, I'd enjoy big band and early jazz on old 78's, for the enjoyment of it, even if they may not be as good as modern LP's.

[@12voltvids]

@@johnhpalmer6098 I think today because we just had a big dump of snow last night not going to be venturing out in the car today, I'm going to pick up that Panasonic black plastic piece of crap that I modded the turntable to do 78 and actually put a speaker inside drill some holes in the cabinet and mountain speaker make it all in one unit for playing 78s and I'll demo how it sounds playing some pop music that I can get away with a couple seconds because it certainly will pull a copyright if I play more than about 5 seconds but that would be today's project

[@DeadKoby]

@@johnhpalmer6098 I was thinking only of 78's produced during the time of this machine. The Pre-Electric Mic era..... I am well aware that the final run of 78's actually sounded great on the tables they were intended for.

[@ernestmccollum2397]

The days where people would show talent instead of computer assisted talent crap nowdays. Even your cat agrees.

[@grizzlyaddams3606]

Now as long as you hate all white people you can get a record deal.

[@Aeduo]

There's plenty of very talented musicians out there still. Probably more than ever.

[@grizzlyaddams3606]

That's the Edison. Now where's the Tesla?! 😄

[@SuperlativeCG]

They are very nice to have.