The glockenspiel is mounted on the front of the organ in three banks of six, one of the notes being a dummy for show only. I checked the note sequence according to the tubing runs and the notes the bars produced when struck. It quickly became obvious that the dummy was in fact tubed and working, while a valid bar remained silent. Fortunately, this mistake had occurred right at the high end of the musical scale, so was less noticeable as it might have been. This had evidently been the situation since the last overhaul by Carl Frei in 1978. Oops!
As the glock was in a vulnerable position and caught the worst of the weather, it was clearly the worst item on the organ for condition. The first job after dismantling was getting the bars re-chromed. I included the strikers in the chroming package, as there was evidence of them having been chromed before, although little remained.
The action units were dismantled and all parts cleaned. All the old leather was taken off and the motors were re-leathered using sheepskin and new ribbing card. All exposed metal parts were treated with black Hammerite for protection, and all exposed wood parts given a heavy coat of varnish or paint.
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© 2018, John Page