Well, I hope it was. For years I've had a problem with my Rock-Ola 468 jukebox. When I turned it on, it would sometimes trip out during the playing of the first record and I'd have to press the mechanism circuit breaker, (top left hand corner) to get it to go again. As I keep it in our unheated summerhouse, I keep a 60w lamp in the bottom in the winter and put a couple of blankets over it and have a rechargeable dehumidifier in it to ward off any damp. I was always using the scan lever to turn it over a few times (that rotates the carousel so you can stop it where you want if you decide to remove a record and add a new one) and I'd play a couple of records every few days in the winter months, use being the best part of preventative maintenance. But more often or not it'd trip out during the first couple of scans, then behave itself. I was always pushing the play relay (that box over the records) to make sure it was seated properly, as it's a big comparatively heavy relay and vibration could disturb it. Over the years I've sprayed the contacts a few times with Servisol switch cleaner. But the other day after it had tripped out, I noticed that pushing on the relay was actually pushing the socket back a tiny bit, which was not secured to the front plate as well as it could be. So I held the point of a watchmaker's screwdriver on the top of the plastic socket to keep it firm, then pushed the relay again. It went in a bit further. I could take that cover off and check the fixings of the socket, but with something that's 44 years old, best to disturb old wiring as little as possible. It's been behaving perfectly ever since. I guess one of the many pins in the relay was not making proper contact. Manchester is a sort of desert as far as jukebox service people are concerned so a visit from an engineer who'd have to travel a long distance would have cost me a fortune. So I'm quite pleased.
Other things are less of a problem. Every vinyl jukebox needs title cards to show what record choices are available. You can actually buy blanks to write the details on in pen and they aren't cheap. I've seen jukeboxes advertised for sale with really tatty title cards. But if you're in the know there's a facilty available from an enthusiast's site, free. You type onto a proforma the information you want on the card. There's different fonts available, different styles of cards and a selection of colours. The application centres the information and automatically adjusts the size of font to make sure that it all fits the space available. You can print them off twenty at a time. It's just a case of using a guillotine to cut out the individual cards. They fit perfectly in the banks of title card holders as long as you keep to the lines provided. So much more professional looking. Here's an example. I keep copies in case any fade. You use ordinary plain copy paper so the light shines through
I rememmber a few of those ! Otis Redding and Percy Sledge are a couple of my favorites ! Martha and the Vandellas come in next !
I put a video of this jukebox on YouTube nine years ago that must have interested a few, as it's had nearly 10,000 hits. The write up includes a simple description of the operation. It's easy to understand that although produced in a factory, they were assembled entirely by hand, no wonder they cost as much as a new small car to buy. The maximum number of records in a vinyl jukebox is 200. When you think about it, all this technology and a few thousand mp3s can now fit into something the size of a packet of fags or smaller. (I've three i-Pods I use in different systems). But for me it's not the same as the "real thing."
