12 January 2011

Project "His Master's Voice Gramophone Model 102" (2/3)

the gramophone mainspring FINALLY arrived in the mail from the netherlands. i ordered it before christmas and it took nearly 3 weeks to arrive. must have took so long because of all the backlog of gifts and crapola the mail people must clear...

anyway so it arrived and i unpacked it, and it looked harmless enough...just a coil of metal, waiting to be crammed into a small container like so:




i removed the cableties and slowly removed the metal wire holding the spring together, and when i remembered: "hey, don't coiled springs have a lot of stored power?", the spring exploded outwards in 360 degrees. i got a nice mark on my arm as a reminder not to be stupid next time.





took me nearly 30 minutes to cram the new spring into the container, whereas the old spring took me only 5...all i can say is that this new spring is definitely able to store more force than the old one.

so there, it's done...i finally managed to fix this antique, i will take a video of it in action and post it up soon.





2 comments:

  1. hello
    my mame is paulo i'm from to portugal
    I need a spring to my his master voice model 101 portable
    do you have for sale
    how much?
    My mail is paulosal99@hotmail.com
    tanks

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  2. How to unpack a new spring safely (anyhow this worked for me, try at your own risk!)
    Using a bench mounted vice that opens to at least 6" (150mm), put the spring in the vice resting with the steel clip sitting above the grips of the vice, then tighten the vice lightly. Using a small hammer, and holding the spring so you have control of it, gently tap the spring DOWN into the vice, tapping where the spring meets the vice jaws, alternating one side then the other until you have worked it down into the vice. Eventually it will be down far enough that the wire clip will come off (if you have your hand there, it will stop the clip pinging off into the far distance). The spring, still tightly wound, is now in the vice. Keeping the spring in place, slowly unwind the vice, and the spring will unwind as you do. Eventually when the jaws are open about 6", you will be able to easily and safely lift the spring out.

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