Hi Glenn and welcome to the wonderful world of musical boxes.
I'll try to answer your questions as best I can, but I'm stating my
opinion only. Before I start, let me put in a plug for the Musical Box
Society International (MBSI). This is a group of collectors worldwide
that all share a love for these wonderful devices, whether it's an 11"
Regina or a 27" automatic-changer Regina, or a Rigid Format Notation
box. You can find them on the web at http://www.mbsi.org/
1. It's supposed to have feet and they're missing. My 8" Regina has
no feet, my 15" Regina has four feet. They look like mushrooms and
could easily be turned out on a lathe. (I'm assuming that yours would
be the same). If you have four round holes on the bottom, measure the
diameter and that's the diameter of the stub; the depth of the hole is
the height of your stub.
How high to make them and what diameter to make the outside? Mine
are roughly 3" diameter and 11/2" high but I'm not measuring them right
now -- it's a guess and anything that fits will look right.
2. How to fix a sticking disc? Discs will tend to stick when the
projections underneath them are bent. You need a good eye and a bit
of patience and a pair of short-nose thin pliers. I also use a round
feeler to shape the projections as necessary. Work slowly and
carefully as they tend to break off more than they like to be reshaped.
The easiest way to find them is to simply look for where it stops --
your bent projection is in that area.
3. What it's worth? eBay auction is a fair judge -- you've got
world-wide bidders looking at it. They know what you paid and what
they think the next one will go for so, that's a fair value. (Unless
you snatched it on a "buy it now", in which case watch eBay for 11"
Reginas and see if you stole it or were taken in.)
4. To replace the lithograph? I saw reproductions on eBay, but only
once, and haven't found them again. I would say to carefully remove it
and mount it on stiff paper, but leave the original unless you can find
an exact reproduction. I have no idea where to find one, though.
5. Where to find one? If I knew the answer to this question, I'd be
there myself! Antique shops are usually over-priced but you can find
things there sometimes. eBay is an excellent resource, of course, and
antique marts. If you're looking for the "one of a lifetime" deal,
you'll have to look hard and wide because so is everyone else.
A word of advice on buying one for restoration: If the combs are
perfect, that's the main thing to worry about. They are set in their
position so that's really the only thing I'd recommend re-moving from
the box.
The star-wheel seems simple and easily understood but it's a real
monster when it comes to setting it correctly to get the right sound.
The star-wheel has many degrees of freedom in placement. You can move
it forward or backward, up or down, up on one side only, forward on one
side only, there's a lot of play in it and it can make your music sound
heavenly or simply awful.
Dampers are crucial and a lot of patience is required to properly
set them. They need to sit evenly between the teeth and that's not
a lot of play you've got there. Then they need to be set so that they
silence the teeth before the star-wheels touch them, they also need to
limit the motion of the star-wheels (a brake).
Being "handy" doesn't mean that you'll have the patience to get the job
done right, but the pay-back is worth the hours of time spent (and from
experience, there are many hours).
Eliyahu Shahar
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