I'm into vinyl jukeboxes and jukebox wall boxes.
The latter are becoming increasingly popular as they can now be connected to an adapter/ipod/hifi system quite easily. I run two.
Anyone interested in this sort of nostalgia I'd be happy to share the limited knowledge I have at my disposal.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dIjaHH-qbPU
The latter are becoming increasingly popular as they can now be connected to an adapter/ipod/hifi system quite easily. I run two.
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
Anyone interested in this sort of nostalgia I'd be happy to share the limited knowledge I have at my disposal.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dIjaHH-qbPU
As a young man I remember well the vinyl juke boxes.
I was amazed by the mechanics of them.
Some of them played the records vertically.
I was amazed by the mechanics of them.
Some of them played the records vertically.
I have worked with jukes and wallboxes for 40 years, I have a few old Rockola 1970s wallboxes, they had RTL and DTL logic inside. Out in my warehouse somewhere.
Wall boxes look good, but how do you interface the selector circuits inside them to your MP3 player? or are you just lighting them up and feeding them audio?
Nigel, not sure what other brands were used in the UK, but over here, the vertical playing ones were largely the Seeburg. German brand NSM worked somewhat similarly, but were less common. Rockola and Rowe/AMI played the 45 rpm records flat on a turntable.
yes, those Seeburgs were mechanical marvels. I think they loved to use 10 moving parts where two would have worked. Earlier ones used mechanical selection memory, but then they came out with the "Tormat" which was a magnetic core memory for selections.
The wall box in your photo would be from a digital selection system. Select a song with a number like 2-1-2. Older wallboxes would have used alpha-numeric, as in selecting K4 or L7. (Though in the 1950s, no one would pick L7.) Those were mechanical, with stepping relays.
Rockola and Seeburg used different, and not compatible wall box control systems, but someone did offer an interface allowing you to connect a string of wall boxes of one brand to a juke of the other.
Here is a video of a guy oiling his Seeburg mechanism. I highly disagree with his choice of oil, but it does give a good view of the mechanism.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vKXRkYFmbtw
I used to do field service on wallbox installations. Pain in the butt going to a busy diner and having to wait for a table to clear so you could get into its wallbox.
In fact, I retired from field service, because I could no longer tote my 50 pound Jensen tool case down into basement game rooms.
Wall boxes look good, but how do you interface the selector circuits inside them to your MP3 player? or are you just lighting them up and feeding them audio?
Nigel, not sure what other brands were used in the UK, but over here, the vertical playing ones were largely the Seeburg. German brand NSM worked somewhat similarly, but were less common. Rockola and Rowe/AMI played the 45 rpm records flat on a turntable.
yes, those Seeburgs were mechanical marvels. I think they loved to use 10 moving parts where two would have worked. Earlier ones used mechanical selection memory, but then they came out with the "Tormat" which was a magnetic core memory for selections.
The wall box in your photo would be from a digital selection system. Select a song with a number like 2-1-2. Older wallboxes would have used alpha-numeric, as in selecting K4 or L7. (Though in the 1950s, no one would pick L7.) Those were mechanical, with stepping relays.
Rockola and Seeburg used different, and not compatible wall box control systems, but someone did offer an interface allowing you to connect a string of wall boxes of one brand to a juke of the other.
Here is a video of a guy oiling his Seeburg mechanism. I highly disagree with his choice of oil, but it does give a good view of the mechanism.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vKXRkYFmbtw
I used to do field service on wallbox installations. Pain in the butt going to a busy diner and having to wait for a table to clear so you could get into its wallbox.
In fact, I retired from field service, because I could no longer tote my 50 pound Jensen tool case down into basement game rooms.
I've wondered whether those wall boxes would be useful, but never acquired one to play with.
There's some in The Postman Always Rings Twice.
There's some in The Postman Always Rings Twice.
Nowdays when you see them, they are usually some bit of retro decoration. They may be partly functional, but real wallbox installations are now rare.
The wallbox is not a stand alone thing, it is a remote terminal for the main jukebox. So you cannot power it up and expect it to play music. Not unless you repurpose it into being a wall speaker. If you are real clever, you could repurpose the selector buttons to control some interface of your liking.
So usefulness to you is a matter of what you want it to do.
I see reproduction wallboxes being sold through "gift" catalogs like Fingerhut or Miles Kimball. They LOOK like old Seeburg wallboxes like this one:
3W1 #5028 - GoodStuffNowLLC
But they are really an AM/FM radio with a cassette player in the side. Like this:
Crosley Select o Matic Wall Box
Mechanicals like the Seeburg, will have mechanical stuff inside. The two rows of interlocking push switches, a rotary stepping unit, a small transformer, and of course the coin acceptor. Modern digital ones will have a circuit board inside, the ten pushbuttons, and the coin acceptor.
If you have a game room with a pinball or arcade video or maybe a pool table, or certainly a jukebox, a wallbox will look great on the wall, whether it does anything or not.
The wallbox is not a stand alone thing, it is a remote terminal for the main jukebox. So you cannot power it up and expect it to play music. Not unless you repurpose it into being a wall speaker. If you are real clever, you could repurpose the selector buttons to control some interface of your liking.
So usefulness to you is a matter of what you want it to do.
I see reproduction wallboxes being sold through "gift" catalogs like Fingerhut or Miles Kimball. They LOOK like old Seeburg wallboxes like this one:
3W1 #5028 - GoodStuffNowLLC
But they are really an AM/FM radio with a cassette player in the side. Like this:
Crosley Select o Matic Wall Box
Mechanicals like the Seeburg, will have mechanical stuff inside. The two rows of interlocking push switches, a rotary stepping unit, a small transformer, and of course the coin acceptor. Modern digital ones will have a circuit board inside, the ten pushbuttons, and the coin acceptor.
If you have a game room with a pinball or arcade video or maybe a pool table, or certainly a jukebox, a wallbox will look great on the wall, whether it does anything or not.
Until recently wall boxes have been "unloved," as they only would work when connected via a "stepper" to a parent jukebox, or a "hideaway," the complete works of a jukebox apart from the selector panel and the speakers.
"Hideaways" were designed for small bars where a full-sized jukebox would take up too much room. So they were "hidden away" in back rooms or cellars in a three-foot cube wooden box.
Recently, it has been possible to replace the "hideaway" with the record carousel etc., with a specially designed adapter the size of a box of matches. The wall box selections are sent to the adapter in the same way as they would to a parent jukebox or a hideaway. The sender in the wall box sends a pulse train signal similar to that of an old-fashioned telephone, but in this case to the adapter.
This adapter can recognise which make of wall box and which model it is by a specific code given to a playlist on an iPod, it will then operate the iPod to play the tracks selected in the order they are chosen. You can only choose the same number of tracks that the wall box was designed to take, regardless of the number of tracks on the iPod, though you can make one selection a whole album. One of the advantages of this system, is that you don't have to have any duff "B sides" as you would with a vinyl jukebox.
All this is in the write-up of the video I linked. But I'm happy to supply any further information if necessary.
"Hideaways" were designed for small bars where a full-sized jukebox would take up too much room. So they were "hidden away" in back rooms or cellars in a three-foot cube wooden box.
Recently, it has been possible to replace the "hideaway" with the record carousel etc., with a specially designed adapter the size of a box of matches. The wall box selections are sent to the adapter in the same way as they would to a parent jukebox or a hideaway. The sender in the wall box sends a pulse train signal similar to that of an old-fashioned telephone, but in this case to the adapter.
This adapter can recognise which make of wall box and which model it is by a specific code given to a playlist on an iPod, it will then operate the iPod to play the tracks selected in the order they are chosen. You can only choose the same number of tracks that the wall box was designed to take, regardless of the number of tracks on the iPod, though you can make one selection a whole album. One of the advantages of this system, is that you don't have to have any duff "B sides" as you would with a vinyl jukebox.
All this is in the write-up of the video I linked. But I'm happy to supply any further information if necessary.
Cool, I think it is great the selection system functions this way. It is cool you put this together, I was hoping to see the circuits involves to do the interface.
Seeburg, for one, made a pretty compact hideaway unit, but many operators wanted to be able to move jukes around location to location, and so as odd as it was visually, I would sometimes find the main juke back in the kitchen or a store room, in all its shiny chrome glory.
It has been at least 20 years ago now, but I had a client get an NSM wall juke. is was an entire jukebox, records and all, that hung on a wall. A sort of wallbox and hideaway combined. Other brands probably made similar, but I never ran into them. These days, a jukebox is little more than an internet terminal with amplifiers and speakers. No record or CD players inside.
Seeburg, for one, made a pretty compact hideaway unit, but many operators wanted to be able to move jukes around location to location, and so as odd as it was visually, I would sometimes find the main juke back in the kitchen or a store room, in all its shiny chrome glory.
It has been at least 20 years ago now, but I had a client get an NSM wall juke. is was an entire jukebox, records and all, that hung on a wall. A sort of wallbox and hideaway combined. Other brands probably made similar, but I never ran into them. These days, a jukebox is little more than an internet terminal with amplifiers and speakers. No record or CD players inside.
There's not a lot to see as far as the equipment is concerned. An unseen 24v adapter powers the wall box motor and lights. The adapter comes with a 9volt adapter that powers it and charges the ipod The connections on the left are power in and line out to an iPod. On the right is the signal line from the wall box, the line out to my tuner/amp and a line to the cancel button.
I've put an iPod next to it to give you an idea of the size.
Compare this with the workings of one of my jukeboxes.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=morLkJDxWyg
I have got a third wall box I've had for some time, long before the adapters became available, I use this as do many people, just to play mp3s through it, via a little amplifier, a 12v adapter powers 2 6v lamps in series and but I've put bigger speakers in it. The title cards just contain useful phone numbers.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0EFV25tY0fc
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Cool gadget! I was fascinated by the wall boxes when I was a kid. Seeburg wall-o-matic especially.
Nice to see a way to interface them with modern tech.
Nice to see a way to interface them with modern tech.
Thanks for your kind words.
In the last year or so these wall boxes have become very desirable.
The adapter costs $109. But if like me you are in the UK you have to add carriage and import duty. 3rd gen iPods are very cheap on eBay and the batteries don't have to be able to hold a charge as the iPod gets its power from the adapter.
It's easy to convert a working wall box to a "stand alone" unit as there's usually enough room inside for the iPod and the adapter, though the coin box can be removed if necessary. It's just a question of imobilising the credit unit after manually putting some credits on it. Or occasionally putting more on. The only downside is you usually have to use those separate little amplifier/speaker sets, which I think look a bit daft, as the internal speakers are very small.
Big problem now is finding a working wall box at a reasonable price.
As "professional conversions" sold on eBay go for several hundreds of pounds.
I was lucky, buying mine before many people knew about the possibilities, I got both quite cheaply.
But I still like my vinyl jukeboxes. They're great to play on warm summer evenings or when I'm gardening.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ISeRK8vCa1M
At the risk of being considered as "bangin' on," it's easy for me to swop over the wall boxes, which share the same adapter. Two quick release connectors to change and the iPod.
This increases my selection possibilities from 160 to 320 with a second iPod.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IXFX8TK3tjU
The advantage of this particular model of wall box is that the title card magazines are easily removed. I obtained a title card magazine from a cheaply acquired non-functioning wall box which also had a very poor appearance.
With a third iPod I've increased the selections available to 480.
Sorry, but the audio has since been removed by YouTube due to copyright infringement.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hi2qHDFL9Ek
This increases my selection possibilities from 160 to 320 with a second iPod.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IXFX8TK3tjU
The advantage of this particular model of wall box is that the title card magazines are easily removed. I obtained a title card magazine from a cheaply acquired non-functioning wall box which also had a very poor appearance.
With a third iPod I've increased the selections available to 480.
Sorry, but the audio has since been removed by YouTube due to copyright infringement.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hi2qHDFL9Ek
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