BSR TC8 cartridge from 50's
Steve Graham
Glasgow, Scotland, and in the 50's and early 60's it seemed like
almost the only record players around were BSR monarch changers,
fitted with TC8 cartridges. They came in three mono varieties (and
one stereo): The white one was the Middle output, middle compliance
unit, the dark brown was the Low output, high compliance, and the
orange was the High output, low compliance (found in some jukeboxes,
and one of my changers).
It seems like this cartridge was/is incapable of tracking bass. Or is
it just that they are old and dried out or something? It's hard to
imagine that there could have been so many of them in use if they were
really this bad: I recently bought an old record player with BSR
Monarch changer and TC8, just like we had when I was about six years
old (after I apparently broke the 78rpm only changer). Even playing
the records we had in those days (scratchy, but I still have most of
them) it threatens to jump the groove whenever bass comes along, even
at forces well in excess of the specified 10 grams.
I tried buying a replacement recently, but it turned out to be a
Japanese copy and a real dud -- tracked no better and sounded horrible
too.
Were the TC8's any good when new? Do I have any hope of finding one
that works? Or... how could something so bad have been so popular?
(Naive question, I know...)
--Steve Graham
sgr...@umich.edu
Allan Brown
Last year I bought several of those and a few other types - All never used
and in original packing. I have only used one and it sounde fine. Soon,
I hope, I will get around to trying out the rest.
One of the cartridges seems to have a very wide frequency response but at
a cost of relatively low output - some where between ceramic/crystal and
magnetic. It is a ceramic cartridge.
Allan
Phil Witt (w4...@mindspring.com) writes:
> On Tue, 27 Apr 1999 05:27:51 GMT, sgr...@umich.edu (Steve Graham)
> wrote:
>
>
>>Were the TC8's any good when new? Do I have any hope of finding one
>>that works? Or... how could something so bad have been so popular?
>>(Naive question, I know...)
>
> AS I recall from those days, BSR, VM, and Webcor were quite popular.
> Seems as though the stylii could be bought in 3 sizes.....was it 1, 2,
> and 3 mils? Maybe you have a wrong or bad stylus. I vaguely remember
> something about lateral tracking problems due to binding or wrong
> stylii causing bass jumping. That was a while back, however.
gbog...@mindspring.com
and early '60s were equipped with pretty horrible cartridges. I used to
call them ''nails''. I was disappointed at how poorly they tracked when
new. This was particularly true of the popular style of turnover cartridge
called a ''Ronette'' which was used in many of the BSRs and VMs, as well as
in many of the manual players. I looked long and hard to find an acceptable
low tracking force ceramic pickup that I could use in these players, since
the player arms were usually capable of better tracking than were these
lousy pickups. I finally settled on a Sonotone 8T series (early stereo).
This unit would track reliably at 3 to 5 grams. Later, Sonotone came out
with the 9T series which was even better, as it would track well down to 2
grams. Of course, designing for these lower tracking forces resulted in
lower output voltages. This is the typical tradeoff - higher tracking force
results in higher output voltage. This is because the piezoelectric
transducer (PZT) element has to be bigger to achieve larger output voltage
which results in its requiring more torque from the stylus to twist it.
Anyway, I would guess that any NOS ceramic cartridges of the original
type that you may find will still work but will track like nails, just like
they always did. The crystal cartridges are worse, and they are all likely
to be defective by now as the rochelle salts crystals deteriorated over
time.
My suggestion is to replace the pickup with something a lot more modern
in design. You can operate most of these record changers in the 6 to 10
gram range if the mechanism is properly cleaned up and lubed. The newer
stereo designs were designed to operate at lower tracking forces as this was
desirable to reduce record wear in stereo LPs. They are perfectly useable
in mono applications. Just wire the two generator elements together in
parallel. If you use only one channel, you will get lower output and you
will hear more surface noise than expected because the stereo channels are
aligned in the pickup to respond to vertical modulation as well as lateral.
By paralleling the channels, you will double the output voltage in the
lateral mode and reduce it to near zero in the vertical mode. By the way,
if you want to play vertical records such as Edisons and Pathes, wire the
channels in parallel but out of phase. This will result in maximum output
in the vertical direction and nearly zero in the lateral direction. Decent
stereo ceramic cartridges are still available from a number of sources,
either as NOS or recent production.
Greg Bogantz
gbog...@mindspring.com
Martin Ackroyd
> On Tue, 27 Apr 1999 05:27:51 GMT, sgr...@umich.edu (Steve Graham)
> wrote:
>
> >Were the TC8's any good when new? Do I have any hope of finding one
> >that works? Or... how could something so bad have been so popular?
> >(Naive question, I know...)
There were two versionis of the TC8, so far as I remember.
The TC8H was a high output version - produced a big
enough voltge to drive an EL84 output valve direct.
It's a turnover cartrige with 2.5 thou radius stylus for 78s
and 1 thou for 33/45.
The other version [TC8M???] was a lower output [~500mV]
with better quality and [possibly] less destructive to
records. I had a BSR turntable in around that used one
and it sounded OK but would not be comparable in any way
with a real hi-fi pickup.
I think I have an unused TC8H [need to dig around to find it].
e-mail me if not having one would spoil your existence.
Martin
Vince Incardona
<gbog...@mindspring.com> wrote in message
news:7g4sje$j22$1...@nntp1.atl.mindspring.net...
> As I recall, many of the less expensive record changers made in the
'50
> and early '60s were equipped with pretty horrible cartridges. I used to
> call them ''nails''. I was disappointed at how poorly they tracked when
> new. This was particularly true of the popular style of turnover
cartridge
> called a ''Ronette''
I had one of these. Gawd, was it awful! In particular, it used to visibly
bounce the
whole tonearm right out of the groove when you played a copy of Three Dog
Night's
"Shambala".
I can't tell you the number of records I took back to the store, thinking
they were
defective.
I finally convinced my dad that it was time for him to get himself a new
stereo. When
he did, I took the old Stromberg. Still have it. Still works and sounds
great.
Martin Ackroyd
>
[snip]
> I had one of these. Gawd, was it awful! In particular, it used to visibly
> bounce the
> whole tonearm right out of the groove when you played a copy of Three Dog
> Night's
> "Shambala".
>
> I can't tell you the number of records I took back to the store, thinking
> they were
> defective.
[snip]
I worked at EMI for a while. It was a real problem for record companies
to make records that played loud [if they did not, the Stones etc
would get very upset their records were not as loud as they should be]
and yet would not jump when played on crappy players.
Martin
Frank Johansen
removed) looked like a little pitchfork?
if so, it was rock bottom of the line in terms of a transducer. used in the
$9.99 kid's players made when plastic was young...
gbog...@mindspring.com wrote in message
<7g4sje$j22$1...@nntp1.atl.mindspring.net>...
> As I recall, many of the less expensive record changers made in the '50
>and early '60s were equipped with pretty horrible cartridges. I used to
>call them ''nails''. I was disappointed at how poorly they tracked when
>new. This was particularly true of the popular style of turnover cartridge
>called a ''Ronette'' which was used in many of the BSRs and VMs, as well as
>in many of the manual players. I looked long and hard to find an
acceptable
><snip>
Steve Graham
<cd...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>was the TC8 the one that had a stylus held in by a single screw, and (when
>removed) looked like a little pitchfork?
It was, yes. And there were at least three mono versions, the -H -M
and -L (Orange, White, and Brown, having Hig, Medium and Low output
and Low, Medium, High compliance respectively) plus a stereo version
(also white, but wider, using only three terminals)
>
>if so, it was rock bottom of the line in terms of a transducer. used in the
>$9.99 kid's players made when plastic was young...
>
What I can't quite understand is, if they were so horrible that they
skipped grooves even on the records available at the time, how did
they manage to sell so many of them?
Frank Johansen
Steve Graham wrote in message <372b427a...@news.itd.umich.edu>...
<snip>
>>if so, it was rock bottom of the line in terms of a transducer. used in
the
>>$9.99 kid's players made when plastic was young...
>>
>What I can't quite understand is, if they were so horrible that they
>skipped grooves even on the records available at the time, how did
>they manage to sell so many of them?
simple! m a r k e t i n g !
:)
Steve Graham
I've just received one of the original BSR mono cartridges in the
mail, the orange one (TC8H) -- thanks Mr. A. -- and lo, it tracks. I
mean obviously it's not a Shure V15, but it had no trouble playing any
of the records I threw at it just now, including those with some
pretty heavy bass, at something under the rated playing weight of 10
grams. (grammes?)
It did have rather thin sound, though, with a (not surprising) upper
midrange resonant peak, apart from which it was surprisingly clean.
The thin sound could be due to incorrect loading, but I don't think
so, since the stereo version (TC8S) had a more normal balance (it
sounded fine, it just wouldn't *play* the records....) Possibly it
was designed that way, a trade off for higher output; or perhaps it's
due to the age of the crystal.
I'd still like to hear if one of the brown ones (TC8L) sounds better.
But at any rate, this clears up the mystery for me: the mono versions
did actually work. The stereo version apparently never did. Curious,
but there weren't that many stereo ones around, I think.
--Steve Graham