16' Reed Offset

Of course, I wanted to extend my Oboe down to 16' (who doesn't want a 16' reed in their house organ?).  I really don't want anything that will shake the house.  Instead I wanted something that would just beef up and color the Bourdon.  I had been keeping an eye out for just about any reed extension (12 notes) with half-length resonators, 3" wind pressure, and not too loud.  I finally found 12 pipes listed on churchorgantrader.com.  They were originally built by Jerome B. Meyer as a clarinet but had quarter-length resonators.  Someone else extended the resonators to half-length and mitered them to fit under an 8' ceiling.  They needed a little work and the price was acceptable, but I knew it would be tough to find something perfect.

I bought these and they came with a small direct-electric chest.  The chest wasn't designed specifically for the pipes, but it should work, right?  Nope.  The toe holes in the chest were much smaller than the toe holes in the pipes.  Plus, I wasn't crazy about having one direct-electric chest with an otherwise electro-pneumatic organ.  So I set about building an offset chest.

The process was much like the chest I built for the Celeste and Rohrflöte.  The design was a little different though.  I put the magnets on the bottom of the chest and ran the vinyl tubing straight down instead of into the side with borings leading to the magnets.  This allowed the chest to be more compact and was a little easier to build.  The drawback is that if I ever need to do anything with the magnet, port, or armature, it will be a PAIN to access.  It worked when it was finished so I'm crossing my fingers.  The picture here shows the chest lying on its back side on my workbench.

The unique thing about this chest is that it is not chromatic.  It is random.  If you look at the album link at the bottom of this text you will see the complex miters of the resonators.  I could either have Bedient un-miter and then re-miter them to fit on a normal chromatic chest, or I could arrange the chest so all the pipes make room for each other.  I wanted to do the latter, but there wasn't a good way to do it.  I solved the problem by making the rack board so some of the pipes lean toward the wall and some lean out into the room a bit.  Not much, but enough that the miters will clear each other.  It will look a little goofy, but they will be in the far back corner (pity the organ tuner!) so no one will see them.

Reed Offset Album