..To me, watching the mechanisms is far more intriguing than the record destruction. I think it would just be cool in a mechanical display box that can be plugged in if desired.
Early country sounds really cool through this thing, natural. Chet Atkins was to die for coming through it.
I hear you on watching the mechanism, maybe a potential cleaner spinner?
I will never forget hearing really old 78's- early country, old blues, Jelly Roll Morton stuff, classical operatic material- played on a friends working fully mechanical machine with integrated horn in the cabinet over 20 years ago. It blew me away with the quality of the vocal timbre range.
I like the glass tile idea, the escaping glow.. plus glass tile is so Deco it's right in place even when the thing is off.
I'd guess the wood glue stiffens the paper somewhat everywhere except the surround. It would also increase the mass of the cone somewhat, which lowers the resonant frequency, though I’m not sure the exact effect that has. I’ve heard of tuning bass woofers with small bits of clay in the dust cap in older designs. The wood glue coating would certainly fix the rip effectively.
On the transformer-
Hooked to the speaker output of a modern amplifier that transformer acts as an attenuator, but it isn't meant to be, and didn’t serve that function in it’s original implementation. Instead, it 'transforms' the native high-voltage / low-current output of the tube amplifier to a lower-voltage, higher-current signal that is appropriate for driving the speaker coil. Most audio tube amplifiers have their output transformer built-in to the amplifier chassis, and it has to be there if the amp and speaker aren’t designed together as an inseparable unit (some exotic transformer-less designs excepted). It is unusual that your cabinet has the transformer built onto the speaker instead, but since this was designed and sold only as an integrated console, it doesn’t really matter where the transformer was mounted.. except that someone working on it could more easily get a nasty shock if they didn’t know what they were doing and electrical standards were a bit more laissez-faire back then.
The reason it acts as an attenuator is that it is transforming the already lower voltage output of your modern amp to a still lower voltage, so the effect is like turning down the volume knob.
The only time similar transformers are attached to dynamic speakers these days is for distributed audio systems where there are many, many speakers connected together but far apart. Think Musak piped through a department store. Because the cable runs are so long, installers would need to use expensive low gauge wire which would still have unacceptably high signal losses, or lots of individual amps, so instead they run thin speaker wire and send far lower current but 70V peaks, and transform that down at each speaker (each point of use) to what you would see at a normal audio amplifier speaker terminal. Westinghouse’s AC power distribution system ultimately won out over Edison’s DC based power system for the same reason: Efficient power distribution over long distances without as much loss, made possible by transformers that change the voltage/current relationship and step down the high transmission voltage as it get to the point of use.
Electrostatic speakers often have input transformers on them for the opposite reason. Electrostatic operation requires very high voltage potentials but minimal current, so they use transformers at their inputs wired ‘the other way’ so as to transform the low-voltage but high-current output of the audio amplifier to the several hundred volts that the electrostatic needs to operate. Years ago, Stax electrostatic headphones shipped with a transformer box so you could use them with any amplifier, not just the dedicated Stax amps.
Topic: Finished Project: Building My Monaural Playback System (Read 17979 times)