Cutter on Misterogers Neighborhood is a Presto?

[diamone]

PBS is re-running all the really old First Series (1968-75) shows on Saturday mornings and the one that was on this weekend featured Fred making his own record on a portable cutter in a suitcase with a linear overhead carriage vs a pivot arm such as one might find on a General.

Anybody know the name and model number of it?

The show sadly is not on e.g. YouTube or Dailymotion or anywhere so I can't show it to you - just have to either know the show already or be able to find it elsewhere.

[piaptk]

I don't know of any "suitcase" size presto machines with a linear overhead. Just the k series that were swing arms.

[emorritt]

My aunt worked on his staff during part of that period and was there when that show was taped. It was a Rek-O-Kut machine, but she told me that the "reproduction" was faked in post.

[diamone]

My aunt worked on his staff during part of that period.

She probably knew my late uncle who was one of the medics that came in periodically.

She told me that the "reproduction" was faked in post.

It sounded like they recorded the repro on like an old Stenorette rim drive reel to reel or something and then piped that back in.

[diamone]

Since there's presumably no such thing as a stereo Rek-O-Kut cutterhead for it - would one of the others i.e. Grampian SC 1 work on it if you added a second amp to it?

[EmAtChapterV]

Oh my god... I've never been able to find this episode or any evidence that it existed, since watching it. It was the first time I ever saw a lathe, and at a single-digit age watching my grandma's television I was like "I WANT TO DO THAT." If anyone can find the episode online I'd be incredibly grateful.

[tragwag]

holy crap this sounds so cool. keep us posted if you find the episode!

[diamone]

Well here's the episode number and descriotion - now all you gotta do is find it.

http://www.neighborhoodarchive.com/mrn/episodes/1248/index.html

Season Four 1971-`72 Premiered May 3rd, Recorded July 22nd 1971

[EmAtChapterV]

Ahh, they have screenshots. So I can answer your original question: that's a Rek-O-Kut M12S overhead with an Audax mono head, presumably part of a TR43H system.

[diamone]

And they go on eBay for $3500? Wish I would have known that when the schools were throwing em all away in the 70s because they were converting to tape. I think a few got traded to a guy with some surplus Ampex 2 track and 4 track e g. 440 types but the rest just got tossed along with about a million blanks.

After finding out you couldn't really cut on old blanks - that part didn't bother me much - but the fact that nobody like my dad or anybody wanted to take em and make e,g, one working one out of three or four just boggled the mind.

So can you or can you not convert such an animal to stereo with a second amp and works and is there or is there not a stereo cutterhead that would work with it?

[EmAtChapterV]

I've seen pictures where someone managed to mount a Neumann SX68 on a Presto 6N. But for the most part there just isn't the real estate in there on "suitcase" Presto or Rek-O-Kut lathes either lateral, vertical or front-to-back to fit a stereo head. Even a mono Fairchild 541A has problems with the damping blocks hitting the center clamp meaning you can't cut smaller than a 4 1/2 inch groove. And any cutterhead with a big magnet will attract itself (sometimes violently) to the stainless steel leadscrew - ask me how I know this.

For a starter lathe potentially modifiable to stereo, it'd be better to go with a Presto 8D/8DG/8GV, 14B or one of the Fairchild lathes, where the overhead mechanism is well back and the cutterhead is mostly out in empty space.

[diamone]

But how do you cut LI and LO grooves on a Presto? All the ones I ever saw or trained on (like the double-cutter double platter version in a console at the middle school I used to go to's radio station they had but never used) couldn't do it - or cut bands inbetween tracks because there was no way to crank the lead screw.

Of course it also had pivot arms and only one pitch - and the left one ran only inside out and the right one only ran outside in but that's neither here nor there.

They had 33 45 78 speed levers but the cutterheads on those were so bad if you tried 45 or 33 on your blank, you could get maybe a little bit better than voice capability,

I read up on that one later on and it said that it was originally in a live concert truck in the days before tape. It's also where I found out WHY there was inside out on odd sides and outside-in on even sides - so the fidelity would match later when you went to pantograph it onto an LP lacquer for production.

But the one I always wanted ever since Len Horowitz showed it to me in an old training movie once was the binaural Fairchild - but good luck finding the lateral-vertical head he used to say or the necessary matrix unit either that goes to it which is needed to convert your signal to something that allows the resulting record to be played on a normal 45-45 system

[piaptk]

Plenty of prestos have cranks: the only ones that don't (that I've ever owned) are the y and k series and some of the 6ds and MRC machines. 6n, 8n, and all the bigger machines have cranks.

[emorritt]

It sounds like the Presto machines you're referring to were 75s (or most likely K series, since near the end of the disc recording era Presto did make a model that was three speed) - PIAPTK is correct that these models had an "arm" with the cutting head like the smaller Recordio or other brand machines, but in a much more professional setup. On the 75s, there was usually a shift lever sticking out from under the turntable that you used to move from outside in to inside out. Like the smaller home lathes, they were incapable of spiral or closeout grooving. Since you mention they were in a sound truck, it's possible someone set one turntable to OI and the other to IO, then removed the levers (or just geared them that way for the K series) so no one could change the setup, so you always got one side OI and another IO. Also, the reason is not for pantographing or dubbing (I think pantographing was only used for cylinders), it's to match fidelity at disc change time. Overhead model Prestos could be fitted with a diameter equalizer, which would boost the high end as the cutting head progressed toward the center of the disc, resulting in less linear distance, which resulted in lower response in that range. The 75s couldn't be mounted with a diameter EQ, so you had to do the alternating OI/IO thing, which is what they did from the start of instantaneous disc recording until the diameter EQs came out.

Yes, I remember this episode as well - I was probably 10 when it came out and I occasionally would watch the show just because my aunt worked on the staff at the time. I even recall asking her where they got the recording machine and if I could have it! My first encounter with disc recording was at a single digit age when my dad gave me a couple of funny smelling records to play with that had my grandparents and cousins voices on them from when he was stationed in Alaska during the Korean war. My mother also had a paper Recordio disc of her singing in a music class in college. I couldn't figure out how these people could have made a record. Took a while before I learned what a lacquer was and about the various recording lathes that were available; alas before I was born!

[EmAtChapterV]

As far as Rek-O-Kut goes, the M12 and M5 were non-spiraling, they didn't have the gears and the overrunning clutch for that. But the M12S and M5S did, thus the "S" in the model name. And you can see the hand crank on the right hand side of Mr. Rogers' machine.

And yeah, hindsight is 20/20 with the high demand and low availability of these machines now. I've heard stories of a lot of fixed-pitch gearbox Scully machines getting dumped in landfills when automatic variable-pitch-and-depth Neumann machines were the hot new thing. It's heartbreaking.

[diamone]

One side OI and another IO is not for pantographing or dubbing (I think pantographing was only used for cylinders), it's to match fidelity at disc change time.

Which is just what I said - whether the end purpose was for dubbing onto LP or not is immaterial - but the handful of e.g. 16-inch or 17-1/4 inch sets I have - and a few more that I have seen on other people's collections - eventually went on early LPs in the late 40s - certainly before anybody but the major labels (RCA CBS etc) had tape.

Even more are coming out now on CD or especially extended box sets - you know where the box is 21 inches tall vs 18 (ROFLMAO - I actually heard somebody in Amoeba the other day telling his buddy the difference between a regular box set and an extended box set - and this poor kid was buyin' it hook line and sinker like cheese to a hungry catfish. I had to leave out of there before I busted a gut laughin'. Poor kid [LOL].)

Seriously though I seen box sets anymore from artists that recorded a lot before tape and maybe had different concerts edited together for the original LP - and the box set has the whole concert from every night it was recorded (like sometimes as many as 5 or 7 nights in the run) which is always interesting to see how loose they get and how they'll get into a groove or have jam sessions during intermissions etc vs the first night.

I have one USO variety show by Louis Prima with lots of period guest stars that was done this way over four nights - and listening to them all (before finding the original 1949 LP it came out as) I would have chosen most of the same takes as the original producers for pretty much the same reasons.

In this case the opening numbers on the first night have that electricity that's missing from the other shows - the ballads in the middle of the concert from the middle two nights are a lot more weepy sounding and heart tugging on the middle two nights - and the closing section has the best performances on closing night.

So I understand why they did it just like I still maintain that the IO and OI was for transcribing onto LP or playing on the radio SO THE FIDELITY WOULD MATCH at side change - but it's still nice to hear all the outtakes just as the people on the individuakl nights heard it.

And I'm not even a fan of 30s and 40s jazz - but this was nice anyway - 21-inch long box notwithstanding (LOLOLOLOL)

[EmAtChapterV]

Just a heads-up that this episode will be airing on the Mr Rogers Marathon Twitch channel later this afternoon. They just started episode 1240 now (10:20 AM Pacific) and it's episode 1248. I've been waiting for this for decades. Now to figure out how to record a Twitch channel. https://www.twitch.tv/misterrogers

[EmAtChapterV]

It's starting in the next ten minutes or so, 2:30 PM Pacific.

[pinkdressstudio]

https://youtu.be/8D0Aan4myoE

[handcut]

Love it.