The best way to check out an S reproducer is to gently blow and suck in the sound tube to see how much of an air leak you have. Originally the R and S was made with a slot to allow the compression ring to be tightened or loosened to control the sound. The ones with large air leaks will not sound very good.
On most of the R and S the 4 minute stylus is worn and can be rotated. I found a way to separate the ones with the brass bottoms with no damage, but I still need to devise a way to remove the compression ring which is normally stuck. I rebuilt an R and rotated the stylus, I compared it with two other R reproducers. The one was air tight, the other had a bad leak. The one that was rebuilt sounded very close to the air tight one, the bad air leak sounded bad especially in the higher end. Edison used soft natural rubber which had better bass response. Replacing gaskets in Edison reproducers with no air leaks makes very little difference, Edison is not gasket driven like Victor's Exhibition is. With the Exhibition the sound quality comes from the gaskets, the mica, and the needle bar adjustment which should be .003 away from the mica, touching dampens the sound, before you tighten the screw. Edison reproducers need to have all the parts moving freely and the stylus in good condition. I have worked on Edison reproducers that had new gaskets along with stuck stylus bars and broken diamond styli and they sounded horrible. Rebuilding is not just changing gaskets. Steve > Date: Wed, 30 Mar 2011 10:54:46 -0700 > From: [email protected] > To: [email protected] > Subject: [Phono-L] Wanted: "S" Reproducer > > "Pinging" the 'list'....anyone have or know of an available "S" reproducer? > > Please email off list with any prospects. > > Thanks! > Ron > > _______________________________________________ > Phono-L mailing list > http://phono-l.oldcrank.org _______________________________________________ Phono-L mailing list http://phono-l.oldcrank.org
