Minifon P55 wire recorder , pocket size of mid 1950s

better resolution schematic

[...] [...]

I found the rubber drive belt was unobtainable, but eventually came across a substitute by following the route taken by my local postman. For some reason, red G.P.O. rubber bands seem to outlast the ordinary type you can buy in the shops.

--
~ Adrian Tuddenham ~
(Remove the ".invalid"s and add ".co.uk" to reply)
www.poppyrecords.co.uk

I can usual fashion-up rubber parts with no problem , rubber tyre, belt and brakes on this all gone west. I was concerned about the plastic from this era. Nothing cracked as far as I can see but I'm aware stress can build up in this sort of plastic and sometimes literally explode to fragments/dust. I was wondering if there was a way of passivating this potential problem or monitoring for it.

I've not heard of any particular problems with these machines, although yours does seem to have had a particularly hard storage life. German plastics were pretty good in that era (self-destructing neoprene came a little later).

--
~ Adrian Tuddenham ~
(Remove the ".invalid"s and add ".co.uk" to reply)
www.poppyrecords.co.uk

and

this

up

fragments/dust. I

or

I didn't know what sort of plastic. I knew an antiques dealer once and she had a plastic grill on a Dancette or something distintegrate into pieces on moving the cabinet, not touching the grill. I once witnessed an old Thermos vacuum flask cap explode with a surprisingly loud bang when the sun got on it, disintegrated to dust and tiny flakes.

I think I can see the original problem area as someone had loosened a screw in that area . The stop slideway works but the rewind slideway is jammed. The piano key pushes a quadrant arm that pushes the spool-swapping slideway for the drive , the quadrant is not turning but not due to 40 years of rust probably.

Does T on the schematic translate as nano as in nanoFarad and how does A arrow W of the switch posistions translate to play/record or engaged / disengaged or forward/rearward

I've just noticed that the peanut valves are Mullard make , in a German made recorder

German

but

dodge.

place

the

removing.

One

the

I'm starting to find differences from this schematic

orientation of triple ganged master switch is different I cannot find the fast acting switch parallel to the seriesed end or reel switches

reel

I can see why the 2 end of reel switches are in series but not why that "switch" is in parallel with another one , the fast acting one, as it will do nothing unless at the end of reel , which has to act before the fast one , so what is the point?

assume

plate

might

will

one

So a mistranslation, for "fast acting" read short duration momentary on. There is some sort of leaf switch under the master sw bank although I cannot see any wire to it without removing the master sw. This is activated by the stop slideway. Indeed, should a reel stop, with the end of wire spring-out lever touching an end sensing switch then the motor would be locked out without such a fudge or manually turning the spool. Presumably p19 of the user manual about the red light coming on at end of spool