[78-L] 14" Pathes and weird noises

[James Tennyson]

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I understand that the thumping noise you described in the Victor acoustics 
was traced to the  recording engineer blowing wax shavings away from the 
recording stylus. When you listen to it , it sounds like just that.  There 
was  am article about this which appeared  about 1923  called " How a 
Ghostly Knock Spoiled a Costly Phonograph " record. It was reprinted in the 
Amberola Graphic. I 'll see if I can find it later.
Message: 1
Date: Fri, 07 Jan 2011 15:13:10 -0500
From: "DanKj" <MLK402 at verizon.net>
Subject: Re: [78-L] 14" Pathes and weird noises
To: "78-L Mail List" <78-l at klickitat.78online.com>
Message-ID: <6533D3A284444BDE8945A53A34D59ED3 at moms>
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reply-type=original

 I wonder if buyers were advised to slow their machines to 68 or 70.  Pathe 
seemed to make a point of using prominently
mounted, large speed dials on many disc machines; a couple of mine are about 
2" across - they obviously expected the
customer to use it.  (Same as the one on this - 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i2IoUtImvKE  .. and if one srew is removed
from the arm rest at the rear, 14" discs can be played on this machine) 
Their "90-100 tours" note was a bit unhelpful,
leaving you to guess.

 After listening to many transfers of Pathe records, I decided that one of 
the noises was an elevator in their building,
and that the master cylinders were recorded at (or near) 160rpm.     Early 
'20s Victor records also have low-pitched
noises - a sort of heavy blowing, brushing, or metal-parts-dragging-heavily 
noise, within the first minute on dozens of
discs recorded in NYC.  An especially loud example has been claimed to be a 
thunderstorm, but it's the same noise as on the
others.  Whiteman's "April Showers" has a good example at 4-5 seconds.