CYLINDER CLEANING
WAX:
Extreme care should be exercised when cleaning wax cylinders. Avoid all solvents. Even well kept wax cylinders may develop a haze or chemical bloom on the surface, and for this they may be dusted with a clean, soft cloth. Playing them with a good sapphire will burnish off the rest. When dusting wax cylinders with a cloth, hold the record so as to avoid any skin contact with the surface and in such a manner as to apply no undue local pressure to any part of it. If uncertain, take a completely dud cylinder and practice handling it with a cloth until you are confident a good one won't fall apart in your hands.
Dust and bloom are not the only dirt to watch out for. Grit from original record cartons can spoil a record, but it is easily removed with a very soft brush or cloth, very delicately applied. Blowing works as well, but be sure not to leave any spittle.
CELLULOID:
When celluloid cylinders were new, it was recommended that they were cleaned with a clean, damp cloth. If the record had become particularly dirty, then the cloth should be dampened with soapy water. This is still sound advice, except that a cloth with clean water containing a little dishwashing detergent is also very effective. Dry them thoroughly with a towel or tea cloth. Avoid wetting the whitened lettering found on the ends of some cylinders. If you do wash out the lettering by mistake, watercolour paint of the kind sold in tubes can be rubbed in the letters to great effect. It is best to choose an off-white or cream colour. The celluloid cylinders manufactured by Henri Lioret were recommended to be cleaned with a clean cloth imbued with a little fine oil, preferably olive oil, which also helped lubricate the record surface and reduce wear.
If a celluloid cylinder is starting to wear, a rub with a silicon polish will lubricate the surface and leave the record gleaming like new. However, it is not always possible to know what else is mixed with the silicon polish, so always try the product first on a cylinder that is already beyond repair. When a celluloid cylinder that has been polished in this manner is played, a small amount of the polish will stick round the stylus. It is a good idea to wipe this off from time to time, in the same way as one does with swarf from wax records, just in case some abrasive grit should get stuck in it and score the record.
CYLINDER REAMING:
By this, we mean using a tool to correct the shape and sizing of the inside of a cylinder so that it fits the mandrel of a phonograph properly. Purpose-made ones for cylinders are available from time to time. They are turned from a piece of wooden dowel and have strips of medium grade emery-cloth glued on lengthwise. Before dealing with cylinder types and their problems, it may be worth sharing a few conclusions derived from experience of using these reamers.
They are very effective, and with little effort, can grind away much more plaster than you expect. So use them gently! Hold the cylinder near vertically, start end down, so the grit can escape, and insert the reamer from beneath. Turn it with as even a pressure as you can manage, because the way our wrists work, most people will tend to grind out more from the start end than the title end. Give one or two turns, clean out the dust and place on a mandrel to check for fit and truth. With a longer job, it pays to insert the reamer in from the title end and give a turn or two. Although it is not designed to be used this way round, it has some effect and will prevent the start end being overdone. Take your time, and check the results frequently. In due course, the emery-cloth will need replacing. It is only glued on, so remove the worn-emery cloth, cut some strips of the same size and quality as the original and glue them on. Presto!
If you use a metal file, work gently from both ends, keeping the blade evenly pressed on the plaster and try to keep a count of how many times you've scraped a given side in order to avoid having the cylinder play off-centre. Scraping off the thickness of a piece of tissue paper makes a huge difference and if you remove such a thickness of plaster from one side and not the other, the record will play off-centre.
WAX:
Very seldom does a standard wax cylinder need any attention in this department and the process is fraught with risk. If a wax cylinder has warped slightly, or has shrunk to be of a slightly different taper to the mandrel, it is best to wrap a piece of tissue paper, cut to size (but not taped or overlapping itself) around the mandrel to make a cushion for the cylinder. It removes the need for pushing the record on to the mandrel with as much pressure as usual, and it is especially useful for cracked records, not to mention wax amberols which are super-brittle, inelastic in their old age, and often don't fit the mandrel as well as they should. Just occasionally, you find bits of wax from the original machining process have consolidated and stuck to the inside of the cylinder causing a high point which at best causes the cylinder to wobble, and at worst, a local pressure point which can break the cylinder. Wax amberols are especially susceptible to this defect and the lump can burst the record if you push it on the mandrel too hard. A nail file, used with extreme care, can remove these local lumps and bumps.
Most 5-inch concert cylinders have shrunk a little. Given the market value of good examples of these records, if you have any number of them and wish to enjoy them, your best bet is to use a phonograph with a concert mandrel that slips on over the standard one and have a machinist turn you up a new, slightly smaller mandrel that fits your cylinders without risking the records or altering your phonograph. The same applies to Pathé's 3 ½-inch salon or intermediate cylinders, if necessary.
CELLULOID:
Celluloid shrinks with age. Early patterns of celluloid cylinder such as early Lamberts, Edison Bell Indestructibles and no doubt others, have no packing or core and they often shrink badly, not to mention warp. They can sometimes be as much as two inches from fitting the standard Edison mandrel. Worse, any attempt to file or ream them can result in them splitting or the end rims breaking off. Even if you can ream them to fit on the mandrel, there is no guarantee the reproducer of an Edison phonograph will reach the playing surface, though it might work with a floating reproducer or the Pathé "Système Vérité" with its floating horn. Such cylinders usually fit on a Columbia 6 inch mandrel without attention, but the standard Columbia reproducers, floating or otherwise, have difficulty reaching the surface. So try using Pathé's floating horn system with a Columbia 6 inch mandrel machine. It's not beautiful, but it works!
The same floating horn method works for Duval and early Liverpool "International Phonograph" Indestructibles, which have a metal ring each end to maintain centring. The rings remain true, but the celluloid itself shrinks, giving you a wasp-waisted cylinder. For these makes, you can use any mandrel.
Later celluloid cylinders have fibre or plaster cores. Each make has its own special headache to offer the collector.
British Lamberts and Russell cylinders have a fibre core, which is normally all right, but the cylinder shrinks lengthwise about one 16th to three 16ths of an inch (2 to 4 mm.), and the title end, which is not always supported by the fibre core, shrinks to the point of not fitting on the mandrel at all. One safe solution is to apply layers of thin card or paper onto the fibre core at the title end until sufficient thickness is built up to support the cylinder that end without interfering with the celluloid. You may have to compensate the other end in similar wise, but at least the process is reversible and does no harm. If you choose to file or use a reamer on the shrunken celluloid at the title end, you may be successful with great delicacy and care; on the other hand, you may just split or break off the title ring. Even worse, the rough handling may even split the celluloid of the whole record, given the enormous pressure on the celluloid developed by its shrinkage.
American Albany Indestructibles with their fibre cores and steel rings, seldom need attention unless the fibre is swollen with damp and the steel rings thick with rust. The rings in this condition can be carefully cleaned of rust and trued up with a metal file. File a little, then check for truth, as often and as long as it takes.
US Indestructibles have a fibre core, originally waterproofed and accurately finished, with no steel rings and no apparent way of stopping the celluloid tube from shrinking lengthwise. They don't often need attention, but if they do, use a purpose-made reamer or a metal file and work gently, checking the results often.
PLASTER CORED CYLINDERS:
Before we move on to the famous Blue Amberol, we must draw attention to the fascinating but alarming plaster cored cylinders of the Liverpool based "International Phonograph" Indestructible cylinders. They are also responsible for the "Biophone" cylinders, which are identical in appearence. Like their earlier versions, these consist of a well moulded celluloid shell with the ends nicely finished to join up with the steel stabilising rings each end. Then they are filled with plaster of Paris, which swells under some conditions, putting pressure on the celluloid tube. The celluloid tube shrinks enthusiastically with age against the plaster with the result that apparently perfect examples are found split, nay, burst open in their containers without any outside provocation. They do this least often when stored in the cool but not cold conditions near the floor. If kept on shelves near the ceiling, watch out for the higher and more variable temperatures there caused by heat rising.
Blue Amberols are the user-friendliest of any cylinders; but they too, have their problems, usually ones associated with the plaster core, and consequently, the need for reaming and repair. Here are a few of them:
Assessment. Before rushing in with a reamer or other tools, which can permanently alter your treasured record, assess where the fault lies. For sections a. and b. above, visually inspect the cylinder for irregularity of shape, cracks in the plaster, plaster missing, etc.
Place it on the mandrel and see how it fits, whether it rocks or rattles and whether it shows signs of being oval. An off-centre cylinder wows once per revolution, but if it is oval, it will wow at least twice if not more depending on whether it ran true in the first place. If it is oval, the plaster will be cracked, which is not in itself a problem, since the flexibility incurred allows the deformation to be reduced by pushing it onto a mandrel as far as it will go, maybe warming it with your hand, and leaving it to adjust itself for a few hours, then it may be pushed on a little further. You will never have a perfect cylinder, but at least a choice or favourite title can be played again. If you ream an oval cylinder, or one misshapen through being dropped, it will remain unplayably misshapen, even though it may fit the mandrel.
If there is a crease, you are stuck with the crease, but you can use a reamer or blade to true up the plaster from whatever seismic event cause the crease and the record can run reasonably true, but with a slight thump.
If the cylinder has a dent that is not due to an air bubble in the plaster, the plaster under it is usually loose. If the dent renders the record unplayable, it is sometimes possible to rub or roll the rounded end of a tool handle against the underside of the depression after removing the loose plaster and thereby make it level enough to allow the record to play again. The more you know about the principles of panel-beating and rolling, the better your chances of saving the record. In any event, glue back the plaster piece or apply new plaster of Paris to prevent further shrinking.
Plaster recently missing must be replaced as soon as possible and reamed or filed level with the surrounding plaster, otherwise the celluloid will shrink into the void, leaving the record unplayable in that place.
Section c. above. Nothing can be done for warped blue amberols as described in this section, but judicious truing of off-centre cylinders can achieve a vast improvement. The easiest to deal with are those that have been off-centre since their manufacture. These appear not to be one-offs, but rather the product of the lathes that finished the cylinder being maladjusted for the batch, since other copies of the same period are often faulty in the same way.
You can either file away the plaster under the high point of the circumference, or pack some card or paper under the low point. The latter solution leaves the cylinder untouched apart from the application of a little paper glue.
You must check for the high point each end of the record. Usually, the irregularity lies in line with the length of the cylinder, but if a butcher has been at the job, it may lie diagonally and you have a cylinder groove which rocks from side to side as well as up and down. This makes the wow even worse. Use a wax crayon, or a soft pastel or a china marker, or a cotton bud with some watercolour paint from the tube we mentioned earlier, or anything, in fact, to leave a removable mark. Set the record turning, and steadying the marker on the straight-edge of the machine, move it closer until it just brushes the high point as it comes round. Or, turn the mandrel slowly by hand with the reproducer down until the floating weight is at its highest and mark that spot. Using a file, gently scrape across about a third of the internal circumference under the high spot. With a keen file, one or two scrapes are often enough. As always, do little and check a lot! There will be a different amount to do for each end. Many blue amberols are true at one end and off-centre at the other, so you have to be observant. If you overdo the job one end, you might have got it nicely centred there, but the other end will be too tight or too loose and flap. Some butcher jobs leave the cylinder so hollowed out, it becomes too big for the mandrel, either all along, or at one end. Packing with paper or card is the easiest solution. Replastering a whole cylinder seldom works without a proper lathe to rebore the cylinder accurately.
Section d. above. Some cylinders, as mentioned above, were sent out with very friable plaster, which broke up within months, not to mention that it gave you chalky fingers. If you find a real treasure that has lost its plaster altogether, you can try replastering, but it is very tricky. Other solutions from the 1920s involved machining an old 2-minute wax cylinder or dictaphone cylinder to size, warming the celluloid shell in hot water to expand it, and stuffing it with the wax cylinder. The results are very good, but take practice to achieve. I have even seen a blue amberol restuffed with an Albany indestructible, to good effect!
Section e. above. Reaming of straightforward swollen plaster is covered in the first section of this chapter on reaming. There is however one further peculiarity, which has nothing to do with swollen plaster, but rather with swollen celluloid. It happens occasionally with blue amberols from the late teens onwards and usually manifests itself on a change in climate when a cylinder arrives by mail from abroad, especially on particularly sultry days in summer. The celluloid expands away from the plaster and the reproduction loses its crisp brightness. The record is not a dud. Keep it in a steady temperature, the cool side of warm and let it settle down to its new climate for a few weeks, then it will be fine again.
Extreme care should be exercised when cleaning wax cylinders. Avoid all solvents. Even well kept wax cylinders may develop a haze or chemical bloom on the surface, and for this they may be dusted with a clean, soft cloth. Playing them with a good sapphire will burnish off the rest. When dusting wax cylinders with a cloth, hold the record so as to avoid any skin contact with the surface and in such a manner as to apply no undue local pressure to any part of it. If uncertain, take a completely dud cylinder and practice handling it with a cloth until you are confident a good one won't fall apart in your hands.
Dust and bloom are not the only dirt to watch out for. Grit from original record cartons can spoil a record, but it is easily removed with a very soft brush or cloth, very delicately applied. Blowing works as well, but be sure not to leave any spittle.
CELLULOID:
When celluloid cylinders were new, it was recommended that they were cleaned with a clean, damp cloth. If the record had become particularly dirty, then the cloth should be dampened with soapy water. This is still sound advice, except that a cloth with clean water containing a little dishwashing detergent is also very effective. Dry them thoroughly with a towel or tea cloth. Avoid wetting the whitened lettering found on the ends of some cylinders. If you do wash out the lettering by mistake, watercolour paint of the kind sold in tubes can be rubbed in the letters to great effect. It is best to choose an off-white or cream colour. The celluloid cylinders manufactured by Henri Lioret were recommended to be cleaned with a clean cloth imbued with a little fine oil, preferably olive oil, which also helped lubricate the record surface and reduce wear.
If a celluloid cylinder is starting to wear, a rub with a silicon polish will lubricate the surface and leave the record gleaming like new. However, it is not always possible to know what else is mixed with the silicon polish, so always try the product first on a cylinder that is already beyond repair. When a celluloid cylinder that has been polished in this manner is played, a small amount of the polish will stick round the stylus. It is a good idea to wipe this off from time to time, in the same way as one does with swarf from wax records, just in case some abrasive grit should get stuck in it and score the record.
CYLINDER REAMING:
By this, we mean using a tool to correct the shape and sizing of the inside of a cylinder so that it fits the mandrel of a phonograph properly. Purpose-made ones for cylinders are available from time to time. They are turned from a piece of wooden dowel and have strips of medium grade emery-cloth glued on lengthwise. Before dealing with cylinder types and their problems, it may be worth sharing a few conclusions derived from experience of using these reamers.
They are very effective, and with little effort, can grind away much more plaster than you expect. So use them gently! Hold the cylinder near vertically, start end down, so the grit can escape, and insert the reamer from beneath. Turn it with as even a pressure as you can manage, because the way our wrists work, most people will tend to grind out more from the start end than the title end. Give one or two turns, clean out the dust and place on a mandrel to check for fit and truth. With a longer job, it pays to insert the reamer in from the title end and give a turn or two. Although it is not designed to be used this way round, it has some effect and will prevent the start end being overdone. Take your time, and check the results frequently. In due course, the emery-cloth will need replacing. It is only glued on, so remove the worn-emery cloth, cut some strips of the same size and quality as the original and glue them on. Presto!
If you use a metal file, work gently from both ends, keeping the blade evenly pressed on the plaster and try to keep a count of how many times you've scraped a given side in order to avoid having the cylinder play off-centre. Scraping off the thickness of a piece of tissue paper makes a huge difference and if you remove such a thickness of plaster from one side and not the other, the record will play off-centre.
WAX:
Very seldom does a standard wax cylinder need any attention in this department and the process is fraught with risk. If a wax cylinder has warped slightly, or has shrunk to be of a slightly different taper to the mandrel, it is best to wrap a piece of tissue paper, cut to size (but not taped or overlapping itself) around the mandrel to make a cushion for the cylinder. It removes the need for pushing the record on to the mandrel with as much pressure as usual, and it is especially useful for cracked records, not to mention wax amberols which are super-brittle, inelastic in their old age, and often don't fit the mandrel as well as they should. Just occasionally, you find bits of wax from the original machining process have consolidated and stuck to the inside of the cylinder causing a high point which at best causes the cylinder to wobble, and at worst, a local pressure point which can break the cylinder. Wax amberols are especially susceptible to this defect and the lump can burst the record if you push it on the mandrel too hard. A nail file, used with extreme care, can remove these local lumps and bumps.
Most 5-inch concert cylinders have shrunk a little. Given the market value of good examples of these records, if you have any number of them and wish to enjoy them, your best bet is to use a phonograph with a concert mandrel that slips on over the standard one and have a machinist turn you up a new, slightly smaller mandrel that fits your cylinders without risking the records or altering your phonograph. The same applies to Pathé's 3 ½-inch salon or intermediate cylinders, if necessary.
CELLULOID:
Celluloid shrinks with age. Early patterns of celluloid cylinder such as early Lamberts, Edison Bell Indestructibles and no doubt others, have no packing or core and they often shrink badly, not to mention warp. They can sometimes be as much as two inches from fitting the standard Edison mandrel. Worse, any attempt to file or ream them can result in them splitting or the end rims breaking off. Even if you can ream them to fit on the mandrel, there is no guarantee the reproducer of an Edison phonograph will reach the playing surface, though it might work with a floating reproducer or the Pathé "Système Vérité" with its floating horn. Such cylinders usually fit on a Columbia 6 inch mandrel without attention, but the standard Columbia reproducers, floating or otherwise, have difficulty reaching the surface. So try using Pathé's floating horn system with a Columbia 6 inch mandrel machine. It's not beautiful, but it works!
The same floating horn method works for Duval and early Liverpool "International Phonograph" Indestructibles, which have a metal ring each end to maintain centring. The rings remain true, but the celluloid itself shrinks, giving you a wasp-waisted cylinder. For these makes, you can use any mandrel.
Later celluloid cylinders have fibre or plaster cores. Each make has its own special headache to offer the collector.
British Lamberts and Russell cylinders have a fibre core, which is normally all right, but the cylinder shrinks lengthwise about one 16th to three 16ths of an inch (2 to 4 mm.), and the title end, which is not always supported by the fibre core, shrinks to the point of not fitting on the mandrel at all. One safe solution is to apply layers of thin card or paper onto the fibre core at the title end until sufficient thickness is built up to support the cylinder that end without interfering with the celluloid. You may have to compensate the other end in similar wise, but at least the process is reversible and does no harm. If you choose to file or use a reamer on the shrunken celluloid at the title end, you may be successful with great delicacy and care; on the other hand, you may just split or break off the title ring. Even worse, the rough handling may even split the celluloid of the whole record, given the enormous pressure on the celluloid developed by its shrinkage.
American Albany Indestructibles with their fibre cores and steel rings, seldom need attention unless the fibre is swollen with damp and the steel rings thick with rust. The rings in this condition can be carefully cleaned of rust and trued up with a metal file. File a little, then check for truth, as often and as long as it takes.
US Indestructibles have a fibre core, originally waterproofed and accurately finished, with no steel rings and no apparent way of stopping the celluloid tube from shrinking lengthwise. They don't often need attention, but if they do, use a purpose-made reamer or a metal file and work gently, checking the results often.
PLASTER CORED CYLINDERS:
Before we move on to the famous Blue Amberol, we must draw attention to the fascinating but alarming plaster cored cylinders of the Liverpool based "International Phonograph" Indestructible cylinders. They are also responsible for the "Biophone" cylinders, which are identical in appearence. Like their earlier versions, these consist of a well moulded celluloid shell with the ends nicely finished to join up with the steel stabilising rings each end. Then they are filled with plaster of Paris, which swells under some conditions, putting pressure on the celluloid tube. The celluloid tube shrinks enthusiastically with age against the plaster with the result that apparently perfect examples are found split, nay, burst open in their containers without any outside provocation. They do this least often when stored in the cool but not cold conditions near the floor. If kept on shelves near the ceiling, watch out for the higher and more variable temperatures there caused by heat rising.
Blue Amberols are the user-friendliest of any cylinders; but they too, have their problems, usually ones associated with the plaster core, and consequently, the need for reaming and repair. Here are a few of them:
- Squeezing or deformation through bad storage, gives dents, creases, oval cross-section, cracked and loose plaster, or plaster missing.
- Dropping; same results!
- Bad quality control at the factory gave rise to off-centred records caused by bad machining, and records with dips in the surface due to collapse of the surface over unseen air bubbles in the plaster. Another quality control issue, not connected with the plaster, is a cylinder of irregular shape, apparently due to rogue draughts giving uneven cooling of the freshly moulded celluloid shells when arranged on racks to cool and cure. Examples are to be found from all periods, but the worst examples are from the time of labour shortages cause by the United States entering the Great War from 1917 to 1918.
- Bad quality plaster from the above mentioned period, which crumbled when handled, even when brand new.
- Swollen plaster. This is particularly the case with blue amberols of the 1920s. In a cost cutting exercise, certain procedures in the manufacture of blue amberols were cheapened or eliminated. The earlier blue amberols had the plaster treated with an oily compound, which reduced the tendency to absorb humidity and expand. This was left out as costs were cut as the market dwindled. As a result, even pristine, unplayed cylinders of this late period often have to be reamed to get them to fit the mandrel. This apart, these cylinders usually ran quite true, and if they don't today, it is because of the butchery of inept former owners who have had a go with whatever tools lay to hand.
Assessment. Before rushing in with a reamer or other tools, which can permanently alter your treasured record, assess where the fault lies. For sections a. and b. above, visually inspect the cylinder for irregularity of shape, cracks in the plaster, plaster missing, etc.
Place it on the mandrel and see how it fits, whether it rocks or rattles and whether it shows signs of being oval. An off-centre cylinder wows once per revolution, but if it is oval, it will wow at least twice if not more depending on whether it ran true in the first place. If it is oval, the plaster will be cracked, which is not in itself a problem, since the flexibility incurred allows the deformation to be reduced by pushing it onto a mandrel as far as it will go, maybe warming it with your hand, and leaving it to adjust itself for a few hours, then it may be pushed on a little further. You will never have a perfect cylinder, but at least a choice or favourite title can be played again. If you ream an oval cylinder, or one misshapen through being dropped, it will remain unplayably misshapen, even though it may fit the mandrel.
If there is a crease, you are stuck with the crease, but you can use a reamer or blade to true up the plaster from whatever seismic event cause the crease and the record can run reasonably true, but with a slight thump.
If the cylinder has a dent that is not due to an air bubble in the plaster, the plaster under it is usually loose. If the dent renders the record unplayable, it is sometimes possible to rub or roll the rounded end of a tool handle against the underside of the depression after removing the loose plaster and thereby make it level enough to allow the record to play again. The more you know about the principles of panel-beating and rolling, the better your chances of saving the record. In any event, glue back the plaster piece or apply new plaster of Paris to prevent further shrinking.
Plaster recently missing must be replaced as soon as possible and reamed or filed level with the surrounding plaster, otherwise the celluloid will shrink into the void, leaving the record unplayable in that place.
Section c. above. Nothing can be done for warped blue amberols as described in this section, but judicious truing of off-centre cylinders can achieve a vast improvement. The easiest to deal with are those that have been off-centre since their manufacture. These appear not to be one-offs, but rather the product of the lathes that finished the cylinder being maladjusted for the batch, since other copies of the same period are often faulty in the same way.
You can either file away the plaster under the high point of the circumference, or pack some card or paper under the low point. The latter solution leaves the cylinder untouched apart from the application of a little paper glue.
You must check for the high point each end of the record. Usually, the irregularity lies in line with the length of the cylinder, but if a butcher has been at the job, it may lie diagonally and you have a cylinder groove which rocks from side to side as well as up and down. This makes the wow even worse. Use a wax crayon, or a soft pastel or a china marker, or a cotton bud with some watercolour paint from the tube we mentioned earlier, or anything, in fact, to leave a removable mark. Set the record turning, and steadying the marker on the straight-edge of the machine, move it closer until it just brushes the high point as it comes round. Or, turn the mandrel slowly by hand with the reproducer down until the floating weight is at its highest and mark that spot. Using a file, gently scrape across about a third of the internal circumference under the high spot. With a keen file, one or two scrapes are often enough. As always, do little and check a lot! There will be a different amount to do for each end. Many blue amberols are true at one end and off-centre at the other, so you have to be observant. If you overdo the job one end, you might have got it nicely centred there, but the other end will be too tight or too loose and flap. Some butcher jobs leave the cylinder so hollowed out, it becomes too big for the mandrel, either all along, or at one end. Packing with paper or card is the easiest solution. Replastering a whole cylinder seldom works without a proper lathe to rebore the cylinder accurately.
Section d. above. Some cylinders, as mentioned above, were sent out with very friable plaster, which broke up within months, not to mention that it gave you chalky fingers. If you find a real treasure that has lost its plaster altogether, you can try replastering, but it is very tricky. Other solutions from the 1920s involved machining an old 2-minute wax cylinder or dictaphone cylinder to size, warming the celluloid shell in hot water to expand it, and stuffing it with the wax cylinder. The results are very good, but take practice to achieve. I have even seen a blue amberol restuffed with an Albany indestructible, to good effect!
Section e. above. Reaming of straightforward swollen plaster is covered in the first section of this chapter on reaming. There is however one further peculiarity, which has nothing to do with swollen plaster, but rather with swollen celluloid. It happens occasionally with blue amberols from the late teens onwards and usually manifests itself on a change in climate when a cylinder arrives by mail from abroad, especially on particularly sultry days in summer. The celluloid expands away from the plaster and the reproduction loses its crisp brightness. The record is not a dud. Keep it in a steady temperature, the cool side of warm and let it settle down to its new climate for a few weeks, then it will be fine again.