Room 1
Bench Inspection

Player Piano
Restorations Illustrated

Room 2 "Dividing The Action"



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The first step I use in dismantling the unit is to separate the head and primary valve chest from the secondary valve chest and the pneumatic boards. This picture illustrates how the complete unit looks.

 


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This is what the secondary valve chest and the punmatic boards look like after the head and the primary unit has been removed.

 


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Here is the picture of the head and primary valve chest. The board that is hanging off the table is called the "L" channel. It channels the primary reduced air signals to the pouches of the secondary valve unit.

 


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It is now time to remove the head from the primary valve chest. The head is the shelf that sits on top of the primary valve chest and contains the spool box, transmission, automatic tracking device and the wind motor. As you can see in the picture you must break the lead tubing away from the junction board before you can remove the head from the chest. Here you can see about half of the tubing has been broken loose.

 


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Notice two things about the lead tubing. First it is cloth covered. This is an extra and was done on your nicer player units to dress them up. It serves no mechanical purpose except to give a little protection to the lead. Second notice the white stuff inside the tubing. This is lead oxide and one should be very careful while handling the this tubing.

 


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With the tubing broken loose and the screws removed the head can be lifted away from the chest and set aside. As you look at the primary valve chest you will notice where the tubing was connected at the rear and you can see the "L" channel board on the front.

 

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Now the upper player action is divided into three major sections. 1. The head, 2. The primary chest, 3. and the secondary chest and pneumatic decks. It is now time to disassemble these 3 individual units.

Room 2
Dividing The Action
Room 3
Comptete Dissasembly
Room 4
Dividing The Primary
Lyon & Healy Tour
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