Video on a wax cylinder !

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Video on a wax cylinder !

Postby Viewmaster » Fri Aug 10, 2007 12:15 am

I have made the first attempts at putting NBTV pictures onto a wax cylinder as per my Edikow machine suggestions.

First two tries shown here. I cannot seem to play it back with a 78 stylus as the stylus seems to want to recut the grooves instead of playing them!

The first is badly over modulated as you can see but the second looks good under a magnifying glass.

So more work to be done still, but the NBTV signal has definately been recorded onto a wax cylinder for the first time! :shock:
Albert.
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First attempt.jpg
First attempt
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Second attempt.jpg
Second attempt
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Postby DrZarkov » Fri Aug 10, 2007 1:03 am

Great! :D

And how does it look on the televisor?
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Postby Viewmaster » Fri Aug 10, 2007 2:36 am

I haven't yet finished my viewer!!!....been too busy on the Edikow! :)

But because the 78 stylus pick up seems to be groove cutting instead of playing there is only noise on playback. :cry: The grooves are modulated but wont play.......
My wax cylinder blanks seem very soft so the playing stylus is cutting them again instead of playing them!
It's somewhat puzzling to see more cutting swarf coming up as one plays back! :shock:

So I plan to get and try standard Edison cylinder recordings and shave the grooves off on a lathe and then re record to see if that works. The Edison material is harder to cut so may well find that some cutter heating is required to help it along.

My cutting stylus at present is a chisel point of approx 90 degree so I might have to experiment with that angle etc too.
Albert.
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Re: Video on a wax cylinder !

Postby Stephen » Fri Aug 10, 2007 11:20 pm

Viewmaster wrote:So more work to be done still, but the NBTV signal has definately been recorded onto a wax cylinder for the first time!
Congratulations, Albert. You may have established a technological milestone: the first video phonograph recording!

What are you using to reproduce the recording? I would be interested in knowing the pickup manufacturer and model, the stylus type, tracking pressure and your method of mounting the pickup.
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Re: Video on a wax cylinder !

Postby Viewmaster » Sat Aug 11, 2007 2:10 am

Stephen wrote:What are you using to reproduce the recording? I would be interested in knowing the pickup manufacturer and model, the stylus type, tracking pressure and your method of mounting the pickup.


It's just a cheap crystal cartridge held on a home made arm fixed to my lathe cross slide as is the cutter. No idea of pressure or its spec. Just cheap and cheerful to experiment with.....but it does play back sound from an old Edison cylinder I have just obtained.

So the trouble must be in the cutter as it leaves swarf in the grooves. This is picked up by the playing stylus and thus just makes a big racket!
The cutter is working as this photo shows on a deliberate out of true cylinder with the cutter moving in to start cutting the grooves. The 'marks' seem are initial cuts being done from the output of the club CD test disc......looks like a pianola roll!

The other thing to be experimented with is the cutting angle to the cylinder. This was straight in at 90 deg, but angling it at about 30 seems to produce more 'interesting' looking grooves. :D

It's obvious now to me, as a beginner to this cutting lark, that it needs very careful cutter shapes/angles/amp drive etc etc.

If I eventually get a decent recording I aim to play it back into my laptop from the crystal cartridge and record it as a NBTV .wav file. Then use Gary's application to play the file, extract a few still frames, and I hope to post them here.
Albert.
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showing beginning of cut grooves.
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Postby Stephen » Sat Aug 11, 2007 2:47 am

The stylus rake angle should be on the order of 15 to 30 degrees from vertical. The swarf that the cutting stylus produces should be a nice clean continuous thread. If it comprises chips or numerous small lengths of thread, the cutting stylus is faulty and/or the cutting depth is mis-adjusted.

I assume that you are using a "stereo" pickup with a standard 3 mil stylus. Cheap pickups do not have very good vertical compliance and will not track grooves with a high degree of vertical excursion. Your problem with reproduction may be in part that you are "overmodulating" the groove.

In my youth I destroyed numerous electrically recorded gramophone records by playing them on acoustical machines that had sound heads designed only for acoustically recorded records. These sound heads did not have the lateral compliance needed to follow the higher velocity excursions of the electrically recorded grooves and just chipped away at them much like a cutter.
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Postby Viewmaster » Sat Aug 11, 2007 3:10 am

Stephen wrote:The stylus rake angle should be on the order of 15 to 30 degrees from vertical. The swarf that the cutting stylus produces should be a nice clean continuous thread. If it comprises chips or numerous small lengths of thread, the cutting stylus is faulty and/or the cutting depth is mis-adjusted.

I assume that you are using a "stereo" pickup with a standard 3 mil stylus. Cheap pickups do not have very good vertical compliance and will not track grooves with a high degree of vertical excursion. Your problem with reproduction may be in part that you are "overmodulating" the groove.



OK on the rake angle.
I forgot to mention that the pick up cartridge is one of the old turnover types for either 78 mono or LP stereo. I am using it in the 78 position.

From what you say I am not producing the correct shape swarf. It certainly isn't continuous, but when turning the wax cylinder up true on a lathe the wax cutting comes off as a very crumbly powder, rather than a continuous thread.

For the cutter am using a steel 78 needle stoned to a 90 deg chisel head. Groove spacing is .008 inch. Might try needle with just a flat for cutting so that groove shape is same as the playing stylus.
So many variables.....so little time :lol:
Albert.
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Re: Video on a wax cylinder !

Postby Harry Dalek » Wed Aug 14, 2019 9:24 pm

I am reviewing Alberts work here amazing getting it to work as is on such hard medium to cut as in (soft) i can see the problem of play back you can pretty much cut the recording as you play back i have done it my self on the cd's
I have not wanted to do this my self as of yet as rather try mechanical play back but an a laser or focused led and optical sensor on the lathe arm for play back would over come the mechanical play back cutting of the recording may be even work on tighter cut tracks where the stylus my slip due to the tight tracking/
All very interesting seeing Alberts work in 2007 ~ ! this should all be in a construction diary
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Re: Video on a wax cylinder !

Postby jjester6000 » Sat Sep 07, 2019 5:43 am

After reading this post, it game me a crazy Idea.
(sorry for the bad quality of my schematic)
20190906_133219.jpg

My idea is to represent one scan line as one roatation around the cylinder, that way, you'll be able to recreate the image by effectively using the cylinder as a stamp on paper.
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Re: Video on a wax cylinder !

Postby jjester6000 » Sat Sep 07, 2019 5:44 am

It is similar to some early phototelegraph machines.
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