Kobe organs

[Martin Cooke]

I saw a Mander Organs advert recently about the new organ in Kobe. It mentions that special earthquake precautions need to be incorporated both to protect the organ and anyone nearby at the time of an earthquake. If John had a spare moment, it would be really interesting to hear a but more about what measures are taken in both respects. Any chance, John?

[CTT]

If the measures are anything like what we are dealing with down here, the designs may well include the following:

Diagonal building frame as well as horizontal and vertical members.

Where rack boards are fixed down with rail blocks rather than pillars, there are brackets placed at right angles to avoid the rails snapping along the grain.

Pipe stays for any pipe over a Twelfth 2 2/3" long.

Half moon stays and brackets for the larger pipes, such as front pipes made T sectional. For pipe only fronts i.e.: with no rails in front of the pipes to prevent them falling forward, the pipes not only have hooks but steel wire lanyards screwed to the pipes and stays to stop them falling away.

Ensuring that instruments situated within chambers are braced so that they cannot rock and smash themselves against the walls or roof.

Fixing down larger items that would previously relied on gravity and location dowels, as the instruments were thrown upwards and halfway down met the ground coming up, (causing in some places soundboards being thrown off their rails and dowels).

 

It would be interesting to know what other measures are being developed to make organs earthquake resistant.