You forget Mr. Edison's kneebreaker.

Steve Smolian

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "David Lennick" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Tuesday, January 08, 2008 11:23 AM
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] vinyl 78's


> For starters, the only 78s that are truly unbreakable are the ones made 
> for mood music libraries (Chappell, Boosey & Hawkes et al) in the 50s and 
> Capitol's "Superflex" kids records in the 40s. Everything else can be 
> cracked by putting your thumbnails together and pushing up..experimenting 
> this way on unwanted discs is a good way to learn which ones will and 
> which ones won't. Even Decca LPs from the mid 50s to the early 60s will 
> fail this test.
>
> Other than that, it may be a matter of what country you're in. Canadian 
> plants kept 78s into 1960 and all but Quality used shellac, while 
> Quality's vinyl was easily cracked.
>
> dl
>
> MATSUBAYASHI 'Shaolin' Kohji wrote:
>> Hi, and happy new year all,
>>
>> I'm just curious - what can I distinguish shellac 78rpms from
>> other thick vinyl-made 78rpms, not only by reading labels saying
>> such as "Merco Plastic" or "Non-breakable"?
>>
>> The last era of vinyl 78rpms can be easily distinguished just
>> because they are very thin and flexible. But other type of vinyl 78rpms,
>> as well as very early LPs, are not flexible and rather thick.
>> I've been wondering whether the last era of thick 78rpms (late 1950s
>> to early 1960s, for example) are actually made either of shellac
>> or thick vinyl.
>>
>>
>> At Fri, 4 Jan 2008 19:15:51 -0500,
>> Tom Fine wrote:
>>> What's the history of vinyl 78's? I have a small pile from I think the 
>>> very early 50's, these are pop and country tunes. Was vinyl used for 
>>> 78's in any mass quantities previous to when vinyl LPs were 
>>> mass-manufactured? The "newest" vinyl 78's I know of are kiddie records 
>>> pressed in the mid-60's. Aside from novelty stuff, was the medium used 
>>> after the mid-60's?
>>>
>>> Thanks for the coming history lesson!
>>>
>>> -- Tom Fine
>>
>> --
>>  MATSUBAYASHI, 'Shaolin' Kohji                  [log in to unmask]
>>                                                  http://microgroove.jp/
>>
>>  GPG Fingerprint: 981C 4171 3044 DC45 6024  EA00 A413 F44D 8FB7 5B97
>>
>>
>