Restoration Project #25: Wire Recorder, Part 1

Most people nowadays think of reel to reel tape recorders as the "oldest" or "original" form of magnetic audio recording. But before the tape technology, there was "wire recording". It is the same basic concept, but uses a thin steel wire as a medium. Because it is so thin, it can only hold so much magnetism. To get usable audio frequencies out of it, the recording speed had to be rather high and the wires would snap... there are officially suggested "knots" on how to splice the wire in such a case.

Devices are still around on e-bay, so I wouldn't consider those to be "collectors items". Since I wanted a usable and decent looking unit, I decided to refurbish it on the outside and replace all the old capacitors on the inside for starters. This turned into quite a project, so here is part one, the case, and as soon as I have the electronics/mechanics finished, I'll follow up with part two.

0:00 Intro, & Presentation
1:33 Disassembly
2:55 Cover, Storage Compartment / The "Nightmare" Nails
4:20 Removing Old Vinyl
6:15 Cleanup / Wood repair /
6:55 First Vinyl / Corners
7:45 Flat Parts
9:15 Trimming Seam
10:08 Panel Replacement
10:29 Inside Lining
11:28 Fittings vs. Wire Wheel / Fitting Paint / Panel Paint / Microphone Paint
12:52 Fitting
14:19 Summary / Credits / Outtake

Music:
My Train's A Comin'
Unicorn Heads

(YouTube Audio Library)

[adriansdigitalbasement]

Your videos always completely blow me away. Such an underappreciated channel!

[gerardzi]

Big job ! the puppet have a beautiful black hat, puppet is a good hacker !

[matthiasjagdm]

You are both cute informative and intelligent, and sound like a vampiric doctor wolf

[shawndogg]

Thats Really Awesome! Atkalar your so talented!

[lwilton]

Of course 10" disc recorders slightly predated wire recorders for home recording. This was a record player with a second cutting head that was driven across the record blank with a leadscrew. You needed special blank disks with a relatively soft surface to record with these things, so the recordings usually didn't last too long before they wore out. Slightly later they had combination record player, record recorder, and wire recorder as one unit. The 10" turntable had a groove in the outside face that was the take-up reel for the wire recorder. That wire _moved_ when it was recording or playing back!

[RetroTinkerer]

WOW that is some impressive attention to detail!
Just how many hours did this take you?

[naderzakaria]

Hello members, I received a device without an internal power converter. Can you help me know how many flutes the device and the tubes need to be fed ?