Voice of Music Console Model 958

[jhtstone]

Visited a local small thrift recently. Wife spotted this console with stuff stacked on it. Hmm, looks to be tubes. Yep, that's good. No price and no sound. Asked about it. $5. Sold.
Got it home, played around in the back. Got sound. Thinking a tube was not seated.
It works and sounds like it has promise. Poor reception and the frequency drifts fast. Turntable turns but makes a lot of noise. No sound from the record that was on it.
Does not have auxiluary inputs and the speakers don't sound very good. This will likely be pulled, amp and tuner face plate in one piece. Use the current phone input for another source. Single RCA 6BQ5 per side.
Hope the pictures post well, this is my first attempt with my first digital camera.
Have schematic as well if it can be used in the database.

 

[Wigwam Jones]

Terrific!

 

[Omegaman]

Interesting that is a 1963. I have a 1963 model 869
Pretty nice look to it. SET EL84 is 4-6 watts
FM Stereo is good
VoM site for everything you need. This guy all that is left of for Voice of Music

http://www.thevoiceofmusic.com/modfind_consoles.html

 

[gadget73]

You should be able to unplug the turntable and feed aux inputs in there, if the turntable is a ceramic cartridge. I think I see a flipper needle tab sticking out the side there.

The table itself is probably easy to rebuild. I did a slightly older model recently and the mechanism is not very complex. That one might be a little more involved, but not likely by much. Mostly its cleaning and re-greasing to make it go again but if you need motor mounts or an idler wheel, thevoiceofmusic.com has all the bits you need.

 

[jhtstone]

Thanks for the replies. I will take a look at the turntable needle. The turntable may be a good project as I have never worked on something like that before. I have another console with a non-working table that I would like to restore.
Not having the room for another console, my first thought was to pull the amp and faceplate as one and use it for a stand alone amp for a modern TT. Don't know if I can bring myself to through away a nice piece of history. The speakers do leave something to be desired though. As a side note, the 45 on the TT currently is Peter Best, the first drummer for the Beatles. Did not know that either. Learn something everyday.

 

[jhtstone]

Here are some pictures of the schematic.

 

[jhtstone]

I have to see if I can get a better shot of the entire schematic.

 

[Dan ʕ•ᴥ•ʔ]

Prolly gonna need it's power supply recapped...and recap the speaker crossover too.
Those caps have probably drifted wildly by now.

 

[Olorin67]

I havnt been too impressed with the stock speakers in VM units, but the guitar amp guys will buy the drivers. The amps can sound very good, you may want to eliminate the loudness circuit, they often boosted the bass to compensate for the speakers. Also if your using the phono input, there may be filtering circuits on there to match the particular ceramic phono cartridge used, you will want to elminate that to get flat response. I use an amp out of a model 581 in my main stereo, sounds great!

 

[LPMike]

Nice console!

Only warning I can give is to watch out for the auto return / auto cue gears. If they are anything like the consoles Ive worked on they can "engage" easily if you are troubleshooting the TT mechanism with power... I've had a few scares when the gear engaged suddenly while my fingers happened to be close by... no accidents but a few startling surprises.