Sometimes It's Something Simple

[Sean Regan]

Well, I hope it was.

For years I've had a problem with my Rock-Ola 468 jukebox. When I turned it on, it would sometimes trip out during the playing of the first record and I'd have to press the mechanism circuit breaker, (top left hand corner) to get it to go again.
As I keep it in our unheated summerhouse, I keep a 60w lamp in the bottom in the winter and put a couple of blankets over it and have a rechargeable dehumidifier in it to ward off any damp.

I was always using the scan lever to turn it over a few times (that rotates the carousel so you can stop it where you want if you decide to remove a record and add a new one) and I'd play a couple of records every few days in the winter months, use being the best part of preventative maintenance. But more often or not it'd trip out during the first couple of scans, then behave itself. I was always pushing the play relay (that box over the records) to make sure it was seated properly, as it's a big comparatively heavy relay and vibration could disturb it. Over the years I've sprayed the contacts a few times with Servisol switch cleaner.
But the other day after it had tripped out, I noticed that pushing on the relay was actually pushing the socket back a tiny bit, which was not secured to the front plate as well as it could be. So I held the point of a watchmaker's screwdriver on the top of the plastic socket to keep it firm, then pushed the relay again. It went in a bit further. I could take that cover off and check the fixings of the socket, but with something that's 44 years old, best to disturb old wiring as little as possible.



It's been behaving perfectly ever since. I guess one of the many pins in the relay was not making proper contact.


Manchester is a sort of desert as far as jukebox service people are concerned so a visit from an engineer who'd have to travel a long distance would have cost me a fortune. So I'm quite pleased.

 

[Sean Regan]

Other things are less of a problem.

Every vinyl jukebox needs title cards to show what record choices are available. You can actually buy blanks to write the details on in pen and they aren't cheap. I've seen jukeboxes advertised for sale with really tatty title cards.

But if you're in the know there's a facilty available from an enthusiasts site, free.

You type onto a proforma the information you want on the card. There's different fonts available, different styles of cards and a selection of colours. The application centres the information and automatically adjusts the size of font to make sure that it all fits the space available.
You can print them off twenty at a time.

It's just a case of using a guillotine to cut out the individual cards. They fit perfectly in the banks of title card holders as long as you keep to the lines provided.
So much more professional looking.

Here's an example. I keep copies in case any fade. You use ordinary plain copy paper so the light shines through

 

[Sean Regan]

Oner of the problems for people who have vinyl jukeboxes is the storing of surplus records.

When I got into this hobby over ten years ago before "the vinyl revival" enjoyed by the masses of music lovers, was finding a record rack.

Now these must have been manufactured in their millions, but at the time, I couldn't find one on eBay. All that has changed since then.

But I managed to find a company that made, or sourced retro gear. So I was able to buy this brand new sixties style record rack.


View attachment 67947


It sits on a saved narrow unit of the Shreiber kitchen we had forty years ago.

It will hold 50 45s.

 

[Peace perfect peace]

Hi sean,
Over here as ive said many times it really is going back 20yrs if not more, And we have a regular what the brits call car boot sales , "Brocants here in france" And the amount of old records for sale really has to be seen,
The big stores offten have music playing and 9 out of 10 times its english music,
As im sending this little lot ive one of those all in CD's and Blue berry hills playing, Brings back all kinds of past thoughts of mates i once had and places we'd go,

 

[Sean Regan]

For many people like me, as I may have mentioned before, it's all about nostalgia and keeping the naffin' things going.
In 1960 my future wife and I at the ages of 19, were "shacked up" or "living over the brush"as it's said up here in Manchester, in a flat in Soho.
So we were often in Ronnie Scott's first club of which we were members and in and out of the many coffee bars in Soho which all had jukeboxes.

There's something about scanning the title cards to choose a record. Then putting your money in and pressing the appropriate buttons for your selection. Followed by the whirr of the carousel and the click of the latch solonoid resetting the buttons. Then the creak of the gripper arm as it places the record on the turntable, the noise of the stylus hitting the track-in grooves, the click as the mute relay changes the amplifier from standby to full on and the anticipation as the stylus tracks in before "your" record starts to play.

It's something modern generations can never experience as for them everything has to be instant.

 

[Peace perfect peace]

Sean
I was standing next to you as you selected that record,
We like many scouser's started a band up and the lead singer was very much as you've described, (wanted it now with little or no effort
put in "but his dad had the van and his son "who could'nt play anything" had to be the one in the spot light for the slow songs,
"The crying shames Go now," I played the drums and could'nt see the snare drum because of this lights out and only his dad putting the light on him,
The words to a lot of the stuff we did we got from listening to Juke box playing in the cafe's through out Liverpools city cafe's and record shops, But our lead would'nt join us and when we did get bookings he'd make his own words up,

Try this one "Sean" Long tall sally, she's so tall she sleeps in the kitchen with her feet in the hall ,
Honest i joke not he got away with that for ages,
It was good days when you think about it, I didnt then think i'd join the Army, see some sights i now wish i had'nt seen,
And i never thought i'd live in a house like i do now,
I see people who are so greedy its just not true, and do you know something they've missed out on so much,
What will they think about when they get older?
No red phone box on the street corner, a meeting place, then only phone in the street,
The Milk man rattling bottles at 6am,

Rainy night in georgia "Playing" just now (Brook Benton)