Repair of the Link AX Part 5


You remember that since the Link arrived from Jake's barn in 1994, it had been used on the first floor as part  of our guided tours.   Very little work had been done on it.   In June of 2017, we moved it into the shop and started work.   Most of the detailed work is now finished and reassembly started.

We made and installed a new mandolin rail, but the pneumatics and system was supposed to work; but would not function.

For the next few days, we traced hoses and fixed problems, such as the soft pedal that did not work, because the tracker was plugged.

Every few hours, I went back and tried to find out why the mandolin rail actuators did not work.
I emailed Paul Manganaro and he sent me a photo of the pneumatic actuator group.

At first I did not see the difference, but after some more looking and thinking, I realized that the one I was working with would hold the bar off, while the one Paul sent me, showed an assembly that would hold the bar.

During the last rebuild, someone put the locking bar on backwards.   Once you understand the problem, it is an easy fix.   To get to it, I had to take a few things apart, but in 45 minutes the problem was resolved.

                                                 REPAIR OF THE LINK AX     PART 4

You may remember that since the Link arrived from Jake's barn in 1994, it has been used on the first floor as part of our guided tours.    Very little work had been done on it.   In June of 2017, we moved it into the shop and started work on it.   Most of the detailed work has now been finished and reassembly started.

When the tambourine was put in place, we discovered one reason it had been damaged.   The paper music shelf had sagged over time and was actually sitting on top of it.   The question was what to do about it.

I decided to build a support on the tambourine mount to support the shelf high enough to clear the action.   It needed about 3/8 of an inch.

Having cleared that problem, it was time to put the back of the case on .   At some prior time, it looks like the cover had been flipped over and torn off the right corner of the back panel.   It had been glued back, but the alignment was off; with result being that the corner was too high.   The glued joint seemed solid, so we cut the corner down to match the rest of the top.

Probably as part of the incidence, some incorrect hinges were installed, ending up with 3 different sets for the 3 hinges involved.   We just took them off and will try to find a set of approximately original dimensions.   At least we will have them all the same.

The mandolin rail was discarded at some past time, so we will make a replacement.   The pneumatic controls are still in place, so all we need is the rail itself.   We have one which will be adapted; but more about that later.

                                                REPAIR OF THE LINK AX PART 3

You may remember that since the Link arrived from Jake's barn in 1994, it has been used on the first floor as part of our guided tours.   Very little work had been done on it; but it became increasingly apparent that it could use a little maintenance.   On June of 2017, we moved it into the shop and started to work on it.

The pump drive on the links was by a flat belt.   The motor pulley is 2 inches in diameter.   Jake had substituted a v belt turned inside out for the flat belt, which had been working since we got the instrument.

The belt was showing age and full of cracks.   We also suspected it of slipping on the drive pulley.   I know it is not original, but I decided to change to a v flat drive.   That meant a 2.25 OD v pulley to get the pitch diameter of 2 inches.   The moor has a .375 shaft and 2 1/4 pulleys all have 1/2 inch bores, so we had to get a reducing sleeve for the new pulley.

At some point, we realized that the motor leads were bad.    If you wiggled the leads the motor would stop.    A trip to our local motor repair shop, where as DeBence supporters they do small jobs for us a no charge, resulted in a motor cleaning and new leads.

                                                            Repair of the Link AX Part 2

You remember that since the Link arrived from Jake's barn in 1994, it has been used on the first floor as part of our guided tours.   Very little work has been done on it, but it has become increasingly apparent that it could use a little maintenance.   On June of 2017, we moved it into the shop and started work.

The tambourine had shown some playing problems, so we looked it over.   The basic mounting was in trouble.   The lower support pin had fallen out, letting the upper pin take all the shaking load and it had worked loose while stripping the screw threads.

The hole was now so big that even an oversize screw would not work, so epoxy was used to hold the upper support screw in place.

Beyond that the next level support had split and had been repaired by adding screws to hold it together.   I cut off the split area and glued a new piece of oak in its place.

The wood nuts on the shaker link were rusted in place and also brittle, so they were removed and the threads wire brushed to clean them up.   Then it was reinstalled.

                                                              Repair of the Link AX

Since the Link arrived from Jakes' barn in 1994, it has been used on the first floor of the museum, as part of our guided tours.   Very little work has been done on it, but it has become increasingly apparent that it could use a little maintenance.   The most obvious problem was that the xylophone did not turn off and on reliably.   Jake had added a booster pump, which seems to indicate there were some other problems.

In June 2017, we moved it into the shop and started work.

The drum assembly was in the way, so we took it out.   This let us see that the drum assembly had been moved to the left, which interfered with the soft pedal pneumatic.   This was immaterial, as the soft pedal control was unhooked.  Set that aside for later.   We could also see that while the control was in place, the mandolin rail was gone, another set aside.   The control for the stop and start of the xylophone was removed for repair.

The vacuum valve was rebuilt; but was not in bad shape and should have worked, so the control for it was rebuilt.   Everything was then reinstalled.

As this point nothing has been tried, so we do not know what the next issue may be.

                                The Edison Standard Phonograph

The Edison Standard is a spring driven external horn phonograph model, that was introduced by Edison's National Phonograph Company, in April, 1899.   It sold for $20, but remember you were lucky to make $1 per day at the time.

We were given a good working one a couple of years ago and already had a non-functioning one.   Since the building is space limited, it seemed wise to sell one of them.

In order to sell one, it has to work.  So we decided to fix the broken one and sell it.   There were two main problems.   The spring was broken about 3 turns from the inner end.   The C reproducer  needed a lot of help.  We don't do reproducers, so we sent it out for repair.   The spring is simple, but as you probably know, it is dangerous to replace a spring if you are inexperienced at this job.   There was also a chipped tooth on one gear, which had to be replaced.

We got it all taken care of in early July of 2017 and will be sale shortly, but there is no horn to go with it, as they are readily available in reproduction form.

Our Nelson Wiggen Style 6

                                Our Nelson Wiggen Style 6

Oscar Nelson and Peder Wiggen, worked as engineers and factory supervisors for the J. P. Seeburg Company, until striking out on their own and forming the Nelson Wiggen Co. in Chicago in 1922.   They built some of the most complex vacuum operated nickelodeons of the era.

Built about 1925, our style 6 ownership is unknown until it was owned by Robert Sabo of Pittsburgh, who was in the process of restoring it, when he passed away.   His sister, Joan Hick, donated it to the museum in 2011, so that it could be restored, preserved and viewed by the public.

As received, the xylophone stack was without valves, though the woodwork to hold them was complete.   We completed the valves, built the pneumatics and hammers.   The wood bars were roughed out, but we had to tune them.   (The machine was built to A=440 specs.)  We assembled the wood block from parts on hand.   We built the soft pedal parts.
We designed and built the on/off valve for the xylophone, as we were unable to get enough information to reproduce the original.  Robert had completed work on the pump and roll drive, so no work was needed in that section.

The music is contained on a paper roll with holes punched in it, designated as style 4X, which normally contains 10 songs.   The 4X roll does not have enough holes to play all of the instruments, so it "plays" a multiplexing device that switches instruments on and off, so they all get to play as some point in the song.   This was missing, but we got enough information to reproduce.

There are currently only 12 of the style 6 units identified, though many more were reproduced.   Ours is one of the four made, with the large selection of instruments including a Piano, Mandolin Rail, Trap Drum, Cymbal, Tambourine, Wood Block and Triangle.   Ours also has stained glass panels, which were rarely used.