Just to start a new thread...  What is it that makes one disc musical
box differ from an identical item?

I had a conversation with Mr. Bob Minnie, who has just overhauled
and adjusted a bedplate and combs for a 24-inch Polyphon Mikado model
that I bought which had been in a fire and stored for 30 years since.
He first bought his identical machine in 1962 and has spent the last
42 years tuning his repairs to his and telling everyone that his is the
best sound ever.  Then mine came along.  Now he admits that this
example sings out over all of them.

I noticed that the motor on it is actually "silent" in comparison to
all the others I have heard.  Could it be that the original guy setting
these up had good days and bad?  What was the "quality control" like if
there was a marked difference between bedplates?  Or is it the intervening
years that reduces the sound on most but not on the odd one?

Brian Chesters