your new local antique repairman
A couple posts ago (Feb 1st) I mentioned that the pump organ broke. Well today I fixed it!
Got some duck cloth from a friend, took apart a few pieces to replace the old ripped canvas, and voila!
Oh right, details, yes. The way these old things work is that you pump two foot-pedals which control the bellows which blows air through the pipes. A canvas strip connects the pedal to the bellows (going around an axel to get the angle right), and it was one of those that had ripped nearly a month ago. At first I couldn't figure out how to get to where the canvas connected to the bellows, so I thought I wasn't going to be able to repair it.
But finally last week I plucked up the courage to pull out a U-nail that held one of the rollers in place, and found that I had perfect access to the bellows end of the ripped canvas! There was just enough room for me to unscrew the block holding down the canvas, and attach a new one.
I guess this would all make more sense if I provided pictures, but alas, I didn't think to catalog this process at all. I'm not much of a camera-at-home person to begin with, and I was a tad too excited about the possibility of solving this problem to stop to think how I could share this victory with others.
Amazing that the only things I needed throughout this whole process was a flat-head screwdriver and a replacement strip of cloth. It's so much less complicated than electronics... so refreshing to have a piece of technology that I can actually begin to understand and repair.
Got some duck cloth from a friend, took apart a few pieces to replace the old ripped canvas, and voila!
Oh right, details, yes. The way these old things work is that you pump two foot-pedals which control the bellows which blows air through the pipes. A canvas strip connects the pedal to the bellows (going around an axel to get the angle right), and it was one of those that had ripped nearly a month ago. At first I couldn't figure out how to get to where the canvas connected to the bellows, so I thought I wasn't going to be able to repair it.
But finally last week I plucked up the courage to pull out a U-nail that held one of the rollers in place, and found that I had perfect access to the bellows end of the ripped canvas! There was just enough room for me to unscrew the block holding down the canvas, and attach a new one.
I guess this would all make more sense if I provided pictures, but alas, I didn't think to catalog this process at all. I'm not much of a camera-at-home person to begin with, and I was a tad too excited about the possibility of solving this problem to stop to think how I could share this victory with others.
Amazing that the only things I needed throughout this whole process was a flat-head screwdriver and a replacement strip of cloth. It's so much less complicated than electronics... so refreshing to have a piece of technology that I can actually begin to understand and repair.