I would be tempted to rig up some batteries to power the preamp. That would remove any ground loops.
Good luck, Dean
Good luck, Dean
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Show posts MenuQuote from: JanneI on March 27, 2017, 11:46:56 AM
Here's my unverified veroboard layout. I figured that since I don't have much time I could just share this if someone likes to try it out. A wise move would be draw a pcb with 9mm alpha pots with same mounting holes as in mk1 panel.. Maybe I'll do it someday
Quote from: jam88 on September 28, 2021, 09:40:11 AMQuote from: christine1117 on September 27, 2021, 09:25:21 PMI understand your comment about wanting to make reeds. I'm a retired mechanical engineer/metallurgist and have owned a number of Wurlitzers, continuously since the 1960's. Before the resurgence of interest in these pianos, I decided to make my own reeds. Identified Wurlitzer's original steel supplier and alloy, plotted the geometries, and pursued the process to shape the reeds that would prevent stress-raising/decarbing/annealing. Wound up making hundreds of reeds of all styles. I considered selling reeds as a cottage industry in my retirement, but decided against complicating my leisure.
If I knew what kind of steel they're made of, I'd give it a shot at making my own.
I had the advantage of being employed for decades by defense contractors, with access to CMM, solid modeling, FEA, FFT harmonic analysis, metallurgical laboratory, etc. Also, my position gave me enough weight with vendors to source small quantities of the alloy steel from the European steel producer. (I needed pounds, they like to ship TONS.)
So now I have hundreds of reed blanks, sitting on the shelf, both 120-style and 140/200-style. The unit cost was fairly negligible.
Where I'm going with this:
Reed steel is VERY hard. Not easy to effectively shape without serious capital equipment. Unless you have access to industrial processes, I'd advise against trying to make your own, just for a few reeds.
When you take this deep a dive into reeds, you begin to discover many, many things that Wurlitzer got wrong WRT reed longevity .
Quote from: gotkovsky on June 12, 2021, 03:59:58 AMThank you - yes I thought I would try a few ideas. They all seemed to give good results, though the fence wire I think will fail the first due to being much softer material. I am glad you enjoyed the pile of tone generator assemblies, I would be interested what is in your pile, what worked? and what you learnt?
Congrats on the progress! Love the stack of tone-generators assemblies at the end of the video, I also have a box full of these haha.
I also tried using bicycles spokes a few days ago just for the sake of it and had pretty good results, it's nice to see that you went further with material experimentations!
Quote from: gotkovsky on June 12, 2021, 03:59:58 AM
Did you try using the thread that's already on the spokes for assembling with the brass block? That would require to machine the brass block on the other side to attach the spoke just like on a bicycle rim though, so I'm not sure that would be a time saver compared to brazing. I think the Rhodes tine are press-fitted into the block, right?
Quote from: gotkovsky on June 12, 2021, 03:59:58 AMThat's an interesting question - I didn't test this, if I get chance ill post some results.
Were you able to hear and/or measure an improvement in sustain with the spoke alone, versus the spoke associated to the tone bar?
Quote from: gotkovsky on June 12, 2021, 03:59:58 AM
Did you have a good result with your reed and tone-bar assembly that can be seen at the end of your video?
Quote from: gotkovsky on June 12, 2021, 03:59:58 AM
I'm also very curious to know what program you are using to simulate natural resonant frequencies in a CAD environment. I'm pretty new to 3D modeling (I'm working with Rhino), and I'd love to learn to use a tool that could do that.
Thanks, and congrats again, so far it looks amazing!
Quote from: epluznante on May 20, 2021, 03:17:55 PMThank you, hopefully we get something useable at the end of this. Still lots of things to work out.
amazing work man!
Quote from: gotkovsky on May 18, 2021, 06:44:22 AM
Once again, that's super cool! What are your plans for the tone generators? Do you want to use Rhodes tines or are you thinking about making your own?
Quote from: sean on April 01, 2021, 04:56:02 PM
Hmmm... if the STL file were available online, this would easily justify the purchase cost of a 3D printer.
Quote from: mjbarber431 on April 01, 2021, 08:28:18 AM
I'm really not an expert on Rhodes' actions, but one thing that may concern others is the reduced hammer throw distance, as you can see that the mod noticeably sits the hammers above the other notes. This may actually reduce dynamic range by reducing the max velocity of the hammer. I suppose the next step, then, would be measuring the output and "bark" from a standardized hard strike on the modded notes compared with unmodded or bump modded notes. Additionally, your dampers will not mute with as much force if your hammers are resting high enough to tension the bridle straps, so watch out for that. Other than that, which may or may not matter, more power to you! I'd love to see more reports on this as you perfect it.