These types of record players were available from 1934 until the early 2000's for the purpose of playing "talking book" records for the blind. These players were usually loaned by the library of congress to blind or visually impaired persons; but, they could be bought from organizations such as the American Printing House for the Blind and American Foundation for the Blind. The first models played 33 rpm records, long before they were availoable to the general public. By the late '50's, 16 rpm records took the place of the older 33 rpm record. By the late '60's-early '70's, 8 rpm records became the norm. Pictured below are some older players from my collection.

Model A1 machine from the '90's. Plays 8, 16, 33 rpm and has variable pitch control. This was the last record player before libraries stopped using books on record.


American Foundation f/t Blind model AC-50. Plays 33 rpm (talking book speed of the day) and 78 rpm. I think this is from 1950 and was available for purchase from AFB.


Model AE-3 reproducer from the mid '60's. Plays 8, 16, and 33 rpm. This was the best machine they ever issued and was the last series to use tubes.


Model C 33 rpm only machine from '55.


Wind-up machine from the '30's. Plays 33 and 24 rpm. As you can see, someone replaced the tonearm with something newer. I'd love to see a picture of the correct style tonearm so that I can fix it back right.


AFB 33 and 78 rpm model from the late '30's-early '40's.


I also have an AFB modified Philco "Bing Crosby" record-in-slot model; but, it's torn up in a box. I also understand that there were other early machines that had radios in them; but, I've never seen one.

Wow to see photos of the player.

I have 2 cases of 8 rpm records. Problem nothing to play them on. The library in my town a long time ago sold them off. These were never used and the library did not have player for them at all. Told me they never see the light of day since no one in this town ever needed them or wanted them.

I did some searching a few years ago why no one ever used them here. What I found is most of the people that would have needed them did so by mail only. The library was not close and most could not drive there.

I so wish I could find a 8 rpm player I have ask searched and have never seen one for sale. I have no clue what is on the disk at all. There the floppy type.

You could get reasonably accurate transcriptions of those if you recorded them digitally from a 16 rpm player and cut the speed in half afterwards. The quality loss wouldn't be much different than making high-speed cassette dubs. Any faster and I think the needle and computer would miss a lot of important detail.

eric

Being legally blind I was a subscriber to the service for many years the floppy type records you describe are probably some sort of record a periodical magazines like national geographic or possibly a newspaper most of the subscribers used the national library service or regional library these libraries for usually located in state capital cities the media could be ordered from very large dick large print books and the items would be sent to your home by the us mail the records usually came in very heavy orange plastic package with a return postage card attached when you finish listening you simply return the item and I sent you another I also had the cassette player very nice quality it had 3 or 4 different a steve an adjustable pitch please listen to the tape as fast as you wanted as for the reason on being around the agreement with the library was when you no longer wanted or needed the service you could simply send equipment back to the library

Sorry for the misspelling in the post I guess my droid voice input May need a little adjustment

Grrrrr - a half hour of writing a reply and it gets erased because the site logged me out by itself.
Will go eat dinner and write it again in Word to post later or tomorrow. In the meantime....

``Paperback'' books also often came out on FD's as well, i.e. extremely popular titles with a limited shelf life e.g. pop fiction, dime novels and romance titles that were printed in the millions.

Due to the limited shelf life of those types of titles - meaning they weren't exactly Ibsen or Shakespeare - it wasn't worth the added expense to make RD's and the big orange cases when you could just run off a million FD's, stuff em in an envelope and send em out. Other than a token few copies to have on reserve at the State Libraries for copying to cassette later - as noted in the previous thread - lots of these types of ``paperbacks'' are FD-only - or as we said - extremely rare on RD.

But there's a few problems with recording double-speed into the computer or tricking a High Speed cassette dubber into thinking there's another tape in there when you put a CD to cassette car adapter in place of the Play tape which I will detail - among other things - after I stuff my face with Boston clam chowder with garlic and onion and five-cheese tortellini in.

Ah - text saved in browser by one of the Windows Accessibility Options - a wonderful invention.

So I'm back from making sure my belly still has it's own area code and can continue.

I have 2 cases of 8 rpm flexidisc records.

By ``cases'' I assume you actually mean ``envelopes''.
As stated previously - they are probably some sort of magazine, newspaper or other periodical.
However, so-called `paperback' books were also produced in the millions on FD.

Problem: nothing to play them on.
I so wish I could find a 8 rpm player.
I have ask searched and have never seen one for sale.

For the reasons stated in the earlier thread - in case of Federal Government legal affairs coming and sniffing around - nobody at places like eBay or the ham-radio/electronics swapmeet at the junior college once a month wants to be bothered with trying to keep abreast of which players were sold outright through AFB and its' licensees and which were strictly loan-only through NLS.

I have no clue what is on the disk at all.

Every FD will have a large-print label on the even side and a Braille marking on the odd side, the same as on RD's and TB's. If you have sight enough to make out the even-side print, you could probably discover the title that way, or if the disc is still in good enough shape, the Braille on the odd side should also be discernible with a little effort.

The trouble with doing the double-speed transfer the CONVENTIONAL way with CONVENTIONAL equipment as seen in this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HnjuBZ1qVsU - where the bass response is almost non-existent - is partly the lack of the necessary extended frequency response in the cartridge, and partly because of the standard conical or elliptical stylus commonly used to track the disc.

Slightly correcting what was said above - in fact even playing the 8 RPM flexidisc at the correct speed of 8 RPM using a normal 0.7 mil conical or elliptical stereo LP stylus will damage the disc to a certain extent just by itself - because the grooves are 0.5 mil vs 0.7 mil - tantamount to playing a stereo LP with a 1.0 mil mono stylus. Secondly - playing the 8 RPM disc at 16 will in fact cause a great deal of information to be lost, nevermind playing it at 33.

In addition, the trouble with using a crystal cartridge - as seen in the video above - is that crystal cartridges rarely go below 40Hz or so. Doubling that to 16 RPM means the low end drops off at about 80Hz - therefore virtually no bass response - as you can hear once the guy takes his video to half in a video-editing program.

A few ways to combat this problem and minimize damage to the disc are:
1. Find a magnetic phono cartridge, either Moving-Magnet or Moving-Coil which has `DQ' stylus availability, order the DQ stylus and replace the conical or elliptical it came with. This type of stylus was developed originally to be able to retrieve the supersonic demodulation tones and program material for the Carrier-Discrete 4-channel (CD-4) quadraphonic records produced for a few years in the early-to-mid `70's.

Due to its' unique shape, this type of stylus is able to ride deeper into a narrower groove without damaging it. In addition - as most if not all RD and TB players featured conical styli - that unlike this reporter - DQ styli being taller and thinner - can ``ignore'' previously-worn portions of the groove - such as that read - and worn out by - a common conical stylus - allowing ``fresh'' or ``previously unused'' portions of the groove to be read - thereby improving the sound considerably. Other names for this type of stylus include Tetra-Hedral, Nude-Square-Shank-Hyper-Elliptic, Micro-Ridge, Fine-Line, Groove-Hugger, or Shibata, named after the original developer in Japan.

2. Couple that with the accompanying CD-4 type cartridge will at least ensure that your 16 RPM transfer of an 8 RPM disc results in a full-fidelity result and not the ``tinny'' sound heard on the later players. This is due in part to the fact that the usable `flat' frequency response on a CD-4 cartridge extends well beyond the range of human hearing, both on top, where the range extends out past 50 Khz, as well as on the bottom where the range often extends down below 10 Hz.

3. In addition to the problems discussed above, transferring at 16 RPM directly into the computer and halving the speed digitally is not advised either due to excessive digital artifacting. The sound editing program has to continuously extrapolate and interpolate the material and create approximations of millions of samples that are not there - and the result can be plainly heard upon final mastering to CD.

So, unless you have either one of those digital mastering suites that the record labels have that can spit out the digital samples at a slower rate than they were recorded at (sort of the reverse of a conventional high-speed CD burner) or else you can change the header of the digital file so that it will play back at half the rate - the result is usually not sufficient for even home listening.

However, taking a normal 16 RPM turntable, attaching it to a variable power source and dialing the voltage down to half, will more or less produce the same result - at least if you can keep the speed steady since quartz-lock will not work at half speed as you will hear in this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=13bTMRtGOaA. In addition, this will have the additional bonus of being able to be captured in full-fidelity without the need for digital trickery as seen here. Be cautious however when performing this step. Many turntable motors will draw excessive current at such a low voltage, and you may result in your turntable motor being burned-up if you are not careful.

The other way you can get an acceptable transfer is to use the DQ stylus in a CD-4 cartridge as described above, and either put a GOOD CD-to-cassette adapter in the PLAY side of a High-Speed twin-transport Cassette-to-Cassette deck, a Chrome or Metal tape in the RECORD deck - set the Dolby to ON, the EQ and tape type to Chrome/Metal and record at the HIGH SPEED setting. Upon playback, turn the speed select, Dolby off and the EQ and tape settings back to NORMAL and record the TAPE into the computer, Then run your de-hiss, de-crackle and other algorithms on that. Or - do the same thing on a reel-to reel for better results - again using high-bias reel tape and playing back with the bias set to low.

The rest of your questions regarding why rural areas were not as well served by RD's and FD's have been answered by other posters.

Here's an example of the container that was used to mail records before they switched to plastic containers in the '70's:


Here's a 12" 33 rpm talking book from '57. This format was used from 1934 until the late '50's:


Here's a 10" 16 rpm book that was used from the late '50's until the early '70's. This is the instruction record that new patrons received with their talking book player. One side is recorded at 16 rpm. The other side at 33 rpm:


Here's a 10" 8 rpm record. The 8 rpm record was used for magazines in the late '60's and was first used for books in the early '70's. The rigid disc was used until the late '80's, before being phased out for flexible disc:


Here's a 9" 8 rpm flexible disc. This format was used from the early '70's and continued to be used until the end of 2000, when records were discontinued. I think the LOC stopped producing books on record in the mid '90's; but, continued to produce magazines on record until the end of 2000:

Yes - the original black cases that were the same as those used for 16 MM classroom films of the same period.

I'd like to find the 9-inch 16 RPM flexi from APH that informed listeners that their Christian Record Talking Magazine (among others) would be phasing out their 12-inch 16 RPM RD's in favor of 16 RPM FD's.

Especially when they didn't do it. They just changed from 12 inch 16 RPM RD's to 12-inch 8 RPM RD's with the same maroon label as the 33 version pictured above from `57.

I have one around here someplace that the CRTM used as a test disc which I kept because it was crazy. Normally the whole magazine would be recorded at 16 - songs and all. Listeners were starting to complain about the low fidelity during the musical numbers every month - especially once they started leaving their annual Music Disc at 33.

So - I don't know how many months they did this for back in the 70's - but they made a number of issues where the one musical number per side was recorded at 33 - with an announcement prior to it that said ``In 30 seconds - Please switch your machine speed one notch to the right for 33 RPM and enjoy the High Fidelity Music Selection for this month''. The reverse announcement would play 15 seconds later - at 33. `If my voice sounds normal, you have switched your machine speed to 33 and can now enjoy the High Fidelity Musical Selection for this month.'' At the end of the song, the reverse of both announcements would play again - one at 33 and 15 seconds later - one back at 16.

After going back to all-16 RPM or even 12-inch 8 RPM like the AFB used to do - CRTM was produced on low fidelity FD's and the point was moot.

Here's the standard C1 cassette player that's been in distribution for over 30 years. This machine will play 2-track and 4-track cassettes at either 15/16 ips or 1 7/8 ips. The LOC books are recorded at 15/16 ips on four tracks. This enables six hours of play time on a 90 minute tape.


Here's the digital player that is making the cassette format obsolete. The books are now sent on flash memory cartridges that can only be played on these machines. There are no new titles being recorded on cassette and the only material I currently receive on cassette are older books and current magazines.

I have some of the last 8 rpm FD magazines from 2000 and the fidelity is really bad, even for voice. The older FD's seemed to be a little better. Obviously, the best sounding books were the older 33 rpm and 16 rpm rigid disc.

Many of the FD magazines were tone indexed. There was usually the following announcement at the beginning of the magazine: "This recording is tone indexed. The beginning of each article will be indicated by a beep, audible only when your machine is in the 16 rpm or 33 rpm position. Once you reach the part you wish to read, hold the tonearm in place and return your speed selector to 8 rpm"

Combined with post below.

Since the track configuration on a C-1 is the standard TB format - four tracks spaced evenly across the tape - vs the standard stereo musicassette format - two tracks extremely close together - a wide guardband down the center of the tape - and then the other two tracks close together - this player is also useful for transferring subscription background music tapes - which are recorded in the same equi-distant track format as a talking book - at 1-13/32 IPS - exactly halfway between 15/16 and 1-7/8.

Or - especially with the ones that feature Auto Reverse - to plug into your grandfather's restaurant PA system and play the music subscription tapes the other restaurants throw away.

I have some of the last 8 rpm FD magazines from 2000 and the fidelity is really bad, even for voice.

Normally, all the RD's FD's and TB's were all recorded real-time i e actually rotating at either 33 or 16 RPM for playback at the same speed - accounting for the high clarity. Shortly BEFORE 8 RPM was deployed, the outsourced mastering houses were mastering the very last of the 16 RPM TB's at 33 - so you'll notice a certain fuzziness in the sound from certain TB's from late `72 and early `73.

However, once the 8 RPM speed was deployed - the numerous mastering houses that got farmed out to do these in the middle of the night during what would have normally been their ``down-time'' got tired of having to spend an hour re-calibrating back down to 16 RPM every night - to master the RD's and FD's at only double speed - from mastering all day at 33 - so they just doubled the tape-speed playback again and began mastering the 8 RPM RD's and FD's at 33 which is why the sound was bad.

Then at the very-very end of FD's - the junior mastering technicians under Chief Engineer Mike Newsom at Eva-Tone - were mastering even FASTER - EIGHT TIMES at 66 2/3 RPM on the old lathe they inherited from RCA Victor which used to cut their Dynagroove titles back in the 60's at double-33 speed. But the normal audio-band only Westrex cutterheads they were using simply couldn't handle the bandwidth. By then nobody cared about the quality because look at the last TB players they had.

But there are a couple issues of magazines from 2000 though that sound pretty good - even though they were mastered on Mattel's old recording lathe used to cut doll records where the normal 33 RPM speed was set to 90 and the 78 RPM speed was set to 133. But see, Mattel spent a mint re-designing it's cutting head so it could handle the bandwidth of double-speed and quadruple speed cutting. So - using a Mattel cutting head at 66 was like using a normal head at 33 - bad bot not TERRIBLE.

Many of the FD magazines were tone indexed. There was usually the following announcement at the beginning of the magazine: "This recording is tone indexed. The beginning of each article will be indicated by a beep, audible only when your machine is in the 16 rpm or 33 rpm position. Once you reach the part you wish to read, hold the tonearm in place and return your speed selector to 8 rpm"

Right - what would ordinarily be a 25 hz ``automation'' cue tone would of course be a low 50Hz hum at 16 and 100Hz at 33 or whatever they used. I just know we used to play around at CARRS in the middle of the night using magazine cue tones to mess with the on-air automation just to see if anybody was listening at 3 Am in the morning. We did it for years and nobody said a thing.

Am I correct in saying that the first 33 rpm talking books from the '30's and '40's had wide grooves, just like regular 78's of the day? That late '30's-early '40's talking book player that I have has a heavy tracking tonearm and a needle like what would be found on 78 rpm players of that era.

At one time, I had an FD of "talking book topics" from the early '80's and there was a segment on there where they asked readers to turn in older playback machines in exchange for newer models because the older ones could no longer be repaired. I wonder how many people actually did that? I'd be willing to bet that there were people still using the old grey tube machines right up to the end of the FD era.

Somewhere around here, I have an issue of "The Braille Technical Press" on 10" 16 RPM maroon label records. This is an electronics magazine that I'd like to find more copies of.

Something else I learned was that many of the older two speed (16,33 rpm) machines were converted to 3 speed machines by the telephone pioneers of america when the 8 rpm disc came out. I was told that the older two speed machines actaully had four speed mechanisms installed in them; but, there was a mechanical stop in place to prevent the speed lever from being moved to the 45 or 78 rpm positions. The person who told me that said that people would break off the mechanical stop and that would enable the machine to play 45 and 78 rpm records.

Here's one on ebay that I wish they'd nail:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Old-Library-Pho ... 4aadfa7064

It's one of those junky plastic ones from the late '70's. It's been on ebay for at least six months and he keeps relisting it for $75. Heck, it's barely worth $7.50! You'd think he'd get a clue after this much time; but, no, let's keep relisting it for $75 because some sucker will eventually buy it.

Here are some records I found on ebay.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/VINTAGE-LP-RECO ... 337162cf97

They have a reserve on them; which, probably means that the seller thinks they are sitting on a gold mine. Usually, when I see a reserve, I move on to something else because it usually means that the seller thinks they are going to retire off of their item.

Another record set I have is the Holy Bible. The dates on the records range between 1949-1953 and they are on ten inch 33 rpm records. Some of the records are on red vinyl. I also have the mid '60's ten inch 16 rpm blue label set that was available from APH.

Where would be a place to find one of these players for sale? I give up on ebay. I been looking for years for one and no luck at all. Do not care about age just need 8 rpm.

Am I correct in saying that the first 33 rpm talking books from the '30's and '40's had wide grooves, just like regular 78's of the day?

The very earliest ones, yes, had standard 3.0 mil grooves, but that didn't last long.
The only official styli which were made were 2.5-2.7 mil, commonly used for radio transcriptions, although people still used the standard 3-mil sapphires - partly accounting for the terrible condition in which many 33 RPM TB's have been left when they have been encountered.

I'd be willing to bet that there were people still using the old grey tube machines right up to the end of the FD era.

And many more still to this day, which is why you find so many of them showing up 40 years later in estate sales by either wives or daughters or daughters in law of whoever the guy was that died - or else estate sales and recovery people - who are basically just pickup artists with trucks and a staff of college kids to Google the Web and find out what their item is worth.

The ``leftovers'' from these types of enterprises are what feeds the thousands upon thousands of bottom-feeders who often are NOT commercially-motivated as the estate sales people are - and can therefore sit on an item for months or years til they find the right information and the right buyer - vs. the estate-sales people - who - like any modern salesman - where all they want is the money in their pocket and the goods out of their warehouse - not knowing or caring about the deposition of any one particular item. The extent of these people's abilities is usually limited to - Googling the Web or store database for product information - or reacting with annoyance wondering why you didn't Google the Web yourself before you came in and ``bothered'' him with requests - for which the answers to - he neither knows or cares about - or swiping either your card or a barcode scanner to check out.

And you wonder why people order online. If you have to run into an idiot - why have to tolerate it out in public when you can get the exact same treatment at home in your own den?

Somewhere around here, I have an issue of "The Braille Technical Press" on 10" 16 RPM maroon label records. This is an electronics magazine that I'd like to find more copies of.

Well - being blind and into vintage electronics - I imagine that you're already a charter member of your local Ham Radio Club - you know - old blind men with nothing else to do during the day but listen to the radio and play Braille Poker - who put on the monthly vintage-electronics swapmeets - most of whom of course were the only talking-book subscribers to magazines such as these. I would imagine any number of these guys - pack rats as they are - would have them stacked to the rafters in their basement garage or attic.

I was told that the older two speed machines actually had four speed mechanisms installed in them; but, there was a mechanical stop in place to prevent the speed lever from being moved to the 45 or 78 rpm positions.....people would break `em off ...and ...enable... 45 and 78 rpm.

All the time. And strip off the decals that ID'ed it as Government property and either give `em to neighbor kids or give `em to the schools to use as extras while you were busy repairing all their old Califones

It's one of those junky plastic ones from the late '70's.

One eBay ad - reported for copyright infringement and Government property violation.

They have a reserve on them; which, probably means that the seller thinks they are sitting on a gold mine.

One more eBay ad reported for violation of copyright.

Another record set I have is the Holy Bible.
The dates on the records range between 1949-1953 and they are on ten inch 33 rpm records.
Some of the records are on red vinyl.
I also have the mid '60's ten inch 16 rpm blue label set that was available from APH.

I kept mine - only because it was on blue vinyl like the 7-inch 16 RPM large-hole Nocturnal Learning set in the leather binder of which I gradually assembled a complete mint condition set over the years.

Where would be a place to find one of these players for sale?
I give up on ebay. I been looking for years for one and no luck at all.
Do not care about age just need 8 rpm.

Plenty of the guys here will no doubt have plenty of extras - and as I said - your local big-city Talking Book repairman may have - if not whole machines left - enough parts to assemble one.

The other way is build your own.

All over eBay is 8 RPM motors - some of em with as many as 16 poles - pull the gear off the spindle - get a bigger one that matches the underside of your turntable - or simply a nylon platen with a small hole in like you get on a Linn - set your turntable down on that - add a tonearm like the million dollar space-turntables do - and poof - 8 RPM turntable.

Troy, I may have an extra grey cased tube model. It will need repair; but, is fixable. If I still have it, it's yours for postage.

Just remember - as the 83D stylus is still a normal 0.7 mil - and conical - when you get it and fix it -
you still need the 0.5 mil stylus - or the Shibata LP stylus - for the cartridge you get - to play the
records without damaging them.