-=> Roy J. Tellason said to Greg Mayman
 -=> about "BAG OF CHIPS" on 01-15-04  04:07.....

 RJT> You really want more than simple on-off control for keying organ
 RJT> notes,  and it's best to have more than one set of keyswitches,  or at
 RJT> the very least double-pole switches.

This was duplicating the effect of the multipole switching that
electronic organs of 30-40 years ago had on every key. Because of
the problems that many of these organs had with dirty contacts,
he decided to replace them with 4066s that were to be keyed by
reed switches operated by magnets under the keys.

It also allowed him to add more channels. For example the
keyboard used in the model he was copying had only four contacts.
He was intending to switch 6 or 8 per key.

 RJT> It's kind of handy to be able to have percussion and sustain effects, 
 RJT> as well as perhaps a loudness variation that depends on how hard (how
 RJT> fast) you hit the key.

True. but that kind of thing was almost unheard of 30+ years ago.

 RJT> Did your friend ever finish the project?

Nope. He had a whole pile of expensive veneered plywood cut to
size for the cabinet, and a whole pile of PC boards made up in
our workshop for the electronics, as well as purchasing the
keyboard and some other parts he couldn't make, but AFAIK that
was as far as he ever went with it.

I guess he must have spent several 100s of bucks on it -- quite a
substantial figure for those days!

Some years afterwards I asked him about it, and he told me the
timber panels got wet from a leak in his shed roof, and had to be
thrown out.

 RJT> Closest I ever came to something of that sort was getting a couple of
 RJT> organs years ago,  but one had been seriously smoke-damaged and I was
 RJT> only able to salvage a few parts off it,  and the other one had
 RJT> belonged to a lady who had a *lot* of cats,  with predictable results. 

Doesn't that really piss you off 

From Greg Mayman, in beautiful Adelaide, South Australia
   "Queen City of The South"    34:55 S  138:36 E

... Boy, I wouldn't want to be in my shoes right now!
___ Blue Wave/386 v2.30

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