Gramophone Record Changers

Thomas Edison's  Fireside Phonograph Picture

Some of the single lps of 78rpm commonly referred to as albums, a name that was invented by recording manufacturers! The limited playing time of 78 rpm records led to the development of  the record changers, that allowed stacks of several records to be loaded on a spindle and automatically played in sequences of one each time! Stacks of 7inch, 10inch or 12inch records could be played automatically but you could not mix 7inch 45rpm with 12inch records, neither the 19inch!

Record Changers Slow Death!

The Turntable had to be set up for size of record and rpm speed! The all mechanical mechanisms were an ingenious design, and most of them were capable of automatically measuring the size of each record as it dropped and positioning the tone arm in the lead in groove of the record. Record changers were provided in most mid-priced consumer phonographs of the 1950s through 1970s. Then came the 1980s and record changers begun to get rarer each day as the compact disc became more popular!