Gramophone Transducer

Your Music from Great-Grandpa's Gramophone

Dave Ehnebuske

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Description

I have an acoustic gramophone from the early years of the 20th century. It's a really lovely piece of gear. Wind it up, put on a 10-inch 78-RPM record, position the needle on a lead-in groove, and out comes the music. No electricity at all.

I have a small collection of 78s for it, and the styles of music recorded on them goes well with the "acoustic" sound that comes out. But I found myself wishing I could get some 78s of more recent music, mostly just to see how it would sound on an acoustic gramophone.

Thoughts strayed to making a device to engrave new 78-RPM records. An interesting project, and certainly doable using modern methods, but a lot of work. Then is struck me, "Why go through all the trouble of making a record that wiggles the needle when I can wiggle the needle much more directly?" And so, this small project was born.

Details

Version 1 of this project – shown here – consists of an LM386-based audio amplifier driving a bone-conduction audio transducer. The transducer has been fitted with a cylindrical metal rest into which the gramophone's needle is placed. The result is that incoming audio vibrates the gramophone's needle just as the groove of a 78 record would: It's like having my whole collection of digital music as 78s.

Here's a short demo of it doing it's thing. With no blinkies, no lasers and no robotic arms, it's not much to look at, but it does work!

Version 2? Bluetooth enabled, because why not?

Files

Gramophone_Transducer_Circuit.pdf Adobe Portable Document Format - 79.86 kB - 05/23/2017 at 00:34		Preview

Discussions

Ken Yap wrote 05/21/2026 at 04:36

Just saw this. This is such a cool and wacky idea. 👍 You should pretend to place a 78 RPM record in the gramophone but actually put the needle into the transducer, and let the visitor be astonished when they come over to look. 🤣

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Dave Ehnebuske wrote 05/21/2026 at 04:51

Ha! Yes, first a real "vintage" 78, then "virtual" 78 with a piece of contemporary music. Bet ya didn't know they made that as a 78!

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danjovic wrote 08/23/2018 at 23:48

This is so cool!!!

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hermit wrote 05/26/2017 at 16:24

Excellent idea! Could you, please, show in detail «the pick-up unit». What conduction transducer do you use? What is the needle rest construction?

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James wrote 05/23/2017 at 15:33

Wow....amazing. Would love to hear this in action. Wonder how it would sound with my Credenza....

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Dave Ehnebuske wrote 05/22/2017 at 22:22

Glad you found it interesting.

As soon as it gets sunny (or I dig up a bright light), I'll post a video.

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jlbrian7 wrote 05/22/2017 at 21:50

Good job! That is a cool idea.

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Gramophone Transducer

Description

Details

Files