And Other Times One Man's Trash...

Recently, I wrote about my curbside finds in Webster Groves.  A couple days later, I drove by the same house to see if any additional "treasures" had been thrown out.  I found this Silvertone portable record player and brought it home.

As you can see, the interior was a little rough, but if it worked, I was okay with it.  It was an older model and took steel needles such as those used in my Singerphone.  After plugging it in, I tried turning it on and promptly received a shock from the metal tone arm.  I should mention I was standing barefoot on a concrete floor at the time and I was quickly reminded of the many similar shocks I'd received as a child from our old stereo we kept in our concrete-floored basement. 

A couple seconds and a pair of rubber-soled tennis shoes later, I tried again.  The turntable sprung to life.  Unfortunately, it was rotating counter-clockwise (the wrong direction for those who don't remember). 

My first instinct was to reverse the motor wires.  That didn't work.  I should have realized it was a non-polarized motor as the plus pin were the same width and can be plugged into an outlet in either direction.  I'm sure you've fought with the correct direction for a plug in an outlet before.  On modern plugs, typically one pin is wider than the other forcing you to plug it in in a specific orientation.  This is for polarized components that require the current to flow in one particular direction.  .

I played around with it for a while and finally gave up.  The only thing this record player is good for is playing backward-masked records.  Maybe I'll finally find out if Paul is really dead.

Sometimes one man's trash is another man's trash as well.