Royal Bell

[SLOT DYNASTY]

I have no idea what royal bell means so off to the Internet for me to do some research, thanks

Royal Bell was a company in Colorado, since the late 70's, that was one of the later publishers of Coin Slot magazine, as
well as building Fake Slot Machines, and reproducing several examples of originals. Most notably, were their reproduction
Mills "War Eagle", that they could build from scratch, as they had all the tooling for the entire mechanism. They called
these recreations the "Golden Eagle", as they were painted all gold, instead of the traditional yellow, black, and red. They
were also stating that they were New, and not advertising them as original, like many do, when reselling them to this day.
Another machine that they reproduced, was a copy of a Fey "3 Jacks", that they did in dime play only. All originals were
mostly penny, and some nickel versions. You still have to be on your toes, as there have been a few, that collectors have
made some changes, so that the dime versions will accept a penny, to try and pass off as original. But there are still other
ways to detect the repros. One way is, most of them had a metal plate, nailed to the inside center floor of the case, with
the Royal Bell name, and a serial number. If the plate was later removed, you would usually see signs of it being there.

[Dave]

I don't think Royal Bell ever came out and said the machines were new.

I think they are the ones that coined the term "remanufactured" which some people thought meant were restored.

If RB was asked what "remanufactured" was then they would come clean but it was up to the customer to ask.

[SLOT DYNASTY]

I don't think Royal Bell ever came out and said the machines were new.

I think they are the ones that coined the term "remanufactured" which some people thought meant were restored.

If RB was asked what "remanufactured" was then they would come clean but it was up to the customer to ask.

You're absolutely right Dave. They never did use the word NEW, but they never led people to believe they were anything
close to original either, and that is the right time-frame when the word "Re-manufactured" hit the coin-op hobby. I have
their original fliers, for both the "Golden Eagle", and the "3 Jacks", but can't find them at present. I also have a flier for
that Fake, built-from-scratch, electronic three reeler, in the fancy oak case, made to resemble the likes of a Victorian
machine. I can't remember how they worded those, as they weren't a copy of anything.

[Dave]

Bill:

By not being totally upfront that the machines were new I think they did mislead people.

In addition, I think they sold tons of these machines to the shops in Vegas who did advertise them as antiques.

If they wanted to make sure people knew what they were buying they should have not created the word remanufactured and also identified somewhere on the machine that it was a reproduction.

Since they were making brand new machines and these machines were slot machines that technically could be used for gambling the DOJ could have busted them for making machines without a license and selling them in states which were not wide open. There are very few states which allow machines to be owned which are brand new. A brand new machine that copies an antique is still a brand new machine.

I appreciate what they did in the publishing area around coin op books but the damage they did to collecting antiques was huge. Anyone who owns an original War Eagle, Castle Front, or Bursting Cherry can thank the pitiful value that these bring in part to them.

Thank goodness their reproduction Rol-A-Tops were so horrible and so ugly that they were not affected. Only the truly stupid got burned by those.

[kennyb]

VERY WELL STATED, A 30 YEARS OLD REPRODUCTION WILL NEVER BE AN ORIGINAL MACHINE. KENNYB

[nvmos2]

Here is an ad from 1983 for the Bill Harris (Royal Bell) One Armed bandit.

[nvmos2]

I used to have a complete set of the Coin Slot; I only have a few from 1983 left.

For those not familiar with the Harriss and their company, Royal Bell;
In 1983, Rosanna Harris was editor and publisher of The Coin Slot magazine.
By then, Bill Harris had a full line of slot figures; the Bill Harris Western Figure Collection;
"13 models" to choose from including a pack donkey which held 4 slot machines.
They were "hand finished and fitted with a Mills Hightop or a token vendor."
Casino Antiques in New York was the "exclusive East coast dealer of the original Bill Harris western slot figures."
Ads did not state the vintage of the machines; I don't know when they tooled up and started making the reproductions.
Interestingly, the 1983 ads also did not mention Royal Bell; apparently it was a side business for Bill.
By 1995, Royal Bell was selling their complete line of reproduction Mills machines;
ads were misleading as to the actual vintage of the machines.
Over 10 years ago, the Harriss sold their slot business and moved out of Colorado.
Royal Bell continued to sell the "remanufactured" slots and the Bill Harris slot figures.
Today, the Royal Bell web site still shows the reproductions and figures for sale.
None of their ads show a pole up the butt of the figure, so I don't think the figure above that started this thread is a Bill Harris/Royal Bell model
(but the angle of the ad photos could have been careful to hide the pole behind the figure's legs).

IMO:
The Harriss were quite the entrepreneurs and made some great contributions to this hobby,
but their reproductions are a great detriment.
I don't know if they are still around or monitor this forum, but it would be interesting to hear their thoughts on the impact of their reproductions
("remanufactured" is a silly bogus term).

[Dave]

Go to http://www.royalbell.com to see how they advertise the machines.

I don't think the people who bought royal bell are still in business. Perhaps someone should call or send them an email.

Here is a description of the War Eagle.

WAR EAGLE This model is circa 1931. The castings are nickel plated and then hand painted with a yellow background. The eagle is highlighted in red and black. The machine automatically pays all left to right winning combinations with 2 coins being the smallest amount for one cherry. The highest pay is the jackpot paying 20 coins from the coin tube and whatever amount is in the jackpot (behind the window in the lower center of the machine). The machine is remanufactured by skilled technicians. It is made by MILLS BELL-O-MATIC in the Royal Bell, Ltd facility in Denver. The machine weighs approximately 100 pounds.

The very first line says circa 1931.

If you knew nothing about slots and reproductions and wanted an antique for your game room. Do you honestly think you would know you are buying a brand new machine?

[nvmos2]

Phone number listed on Royal Bell web site is no longer in service.

CORRECTION:
When I first tried their number, I could swear I got an "out of service" message.
I tried again just for the heck of it and got an answering machine, but not a professional business type message on the machine,
just "the party is not available."

[Anglobritish]

All very interesting stuff, but my personal view is that Bill and Rosanna Harris were only in it for the money, I met them in 1980 in L.A. they then started coming to the trade shows i the U.K. buying used slot machines, after that they started having the reproduction machines built, they even went so far as to have the reproduction small statutes made, I am not a fan or have never been a fan of these types of characters, to me the word Remanufactured means an original item rebuilt, this was not the case with Royal Bell, I called Bill Harris a couple of years ago, he was not interested in even talking about the the hobby.

When Rosanna published their Coin Slot books, they even copied the name from the British Trade publication that started in 1966, and when they published the Nic Costa articles, they were the exact article that were published in the British Coin Slot some time earlier.

We all know that reproductions of slot machines leaves a nasty taste in the mouths of real collectors, it also preys on these new slot machine collectors who want to buy some of the Mills early models, but perhaps to their innocent eyes they will be buying basically a fake product. That is not a good image of our hobby, I tell these would be collectors to check out this Forum before attempting to buy this type of item (There are some great professionals here, who can tell them what to look for) Reproduced does not mean Remanufactured.