Allen TC-4 Project

[Silken Path]

Oh. That's a fairly steep little driveway, but the truck is a Ram 2500 HD - a 3/4-ton diesel. That's sort of an illusion. I usually do load the organ right in the front in order to have SOME tongue weight. The truck and trailer were both flat on level ground.

BTW, after taking the speakers, bench, pedals, and amp shelf out and sliding the organ to the rear, I unhooked the trailer and put a floor jack under the front skid pad. Then I jacked up the front until the floor of the trailer was the same height as the dollies... and pushed the organ right out the door onto the dollies.

It was MUCH easier to unload than the previous one, which I carried in the back of the truck - 34" up there at tailgate height. My truck has the shackles on the rear axle turned over in order to lower the rear (the height of the axle), but it's still pretty high. That simple mod, which takes a shop thirty minutes to do, is also believed to improve handling. (It still rides like a cob when it's empty.)

***

Michael - I looked at it again and I see what you mean. The truck is at an angle and is already facing up the hill. That's an uphill turn to the right just beyond the trailer.

Putting the house right in the top of the hill allowed for a terrific basement.

[Kurzweil]

Analog Service Manual

I have the analog service manual, which is pretty much the same for classical or theater. I tried to attach it but it is too large. I have attempted to put it into the reference section of the forum but suspect that I also failed there. It is in two sections of 50 pages each and will fit in a single e-mail, if anyone needs it. I really don't think that Allen cares about sharing information on 1967 model organs, which is what this TC-4 and also my Theater Deluxe is (was). The manual primarily covers troubleshooting the tone generators, keying, stop action (relay). It states that it covers 1938 to 1977 and seems to be well written.

[Silken Path]

Thanks - that's generous. How large are they? I may be able to request to Admin to host them. He can be pretty reasonable.

[Silken Path]

The '67 TC-4 now has working pedals. The 3M "3407NA" fabric friction tape is a pretty good match for the original tape Allen used on the pedalboard and setterboard bundles in terms or appearance and texture, but it's not quite as thick. I could see the outline of the wire wrapping loom under it. To compensate, I used two layers of the tape. It's also sticky only one side, so it won't be a dirt and dust magnet.

Does anybody else think it's a little tacky for Allen to have left those wires hanging down under the manuals? They could have used reels or something inside in order to feed and retract them. OK. That's my most minor be-itch of the day.

Still left to do is to replace the power cord (the Tripp Lite Isobar 6 in white came today - looks like quality - less than $50 at Amazon), and I need to put the cover back on the power section of the barrier strip. I'll get a final photo showing where all the connections went (and the color coding - very useful if one has the original cables).

The mystery sticking notes have become a lot less frequent. They may just fade away.

I want to spray the magnet assemblies. I have two that don't always want to "clear," but they otherwise work fine. I propose to use D5 for that.

After that I'm going to work on the finish. It looks like it has dull layers of wax buildup on it. I took a little off with a Pampers (don't laugh - they are inexpensive and I like to keep them as handy wipes) and it made a noticeable difference. Got it down to a multitude of very fine scratches.

For usage notes, I still get the sensation that I'm sitting way up there and closer to the manuals than on any of my other organs. My elbow to wrist angle is slightly down to the lower manual. I'm getting along with the textured plastic keys just fine so far, and the crunching sound of the keys has been going away - I don't have any explanation for that. My first experience with a strict AGO organ and pedalboard hasn't been too traumatic so far, although I have only previously played spinets and flat Hammond-style 25s (Conn-Thomas-Rodgers-Hammond). I've spent the last six months or so trying to get my foot off the expression pedal. (I like to saw on it like a Hammond.)

I also want to install a headphone jack. I've read that the output at the terminals on the floor is high impedance, low power, and also that the T-50 amps have preamps in them. I also have the three antiphonal stops I can borrow, say to switch some small relays from the output to a tiny headphone amp.

[Larrytow]

BTW, after taking the speakers, bench, pedals, and amp shelf out and sliding the organ to the rear, I unhooked the trailer and put a floor jack under the front skid pad. Then I jacked up the front until the floor of the trailer was the same height as the dollies... and pushed the organ right out the door onto the dollies.

Excellent thinking there ! Applied Physics is what big organ moving is all about. Actual tilting trailers are handy too for the same type of results.

[Larrytow]

Does anybody else think it's a little tacky for Allen to have left those wires hanging down under the manuals? They could have used reels or something inside in order to feed and retract them. OK. That's my most minor be-itch of the day.


After that I'm going to work on the finish. It looks like it has dull layers of wax buildup on it. I took a little off with a Pampers (don't laugh - they are inexpensive and I like to keep them as handy wipes) and it made a noticeable difference. Got it down to a multitude of very fine scratches.

I kinda thought the same thing about the preset drawer cables on mine too. But after thinking it though some, you realize that they don't get used all that often, so wearing them out would be pretty unusual I think. Getting a leg tangled in them could possibly happen I guess, but they are rather out of the way in normal playing. But ya, not as elegant as one might expect.

When you say you used a Pampers, you mean the wipes, not an actual diaper ? I use those wipes for cleaning all sorts of organ stuff ( and other stuff too ), and they do work real nice. But I never use the actual baby wipe ones, because they almost always have Aloe or some other similar lotion in them. If you use those, you are kinda adding more film to what you are trying to clean. I use the generic Adult Wipes that you can get at the dollar stores. Those ( most anyhow - gotta read the package ) don't have the Aloe or lotion in them, and they are cheaper than the brand name ones. Bigger in size too.

Particularly for cleaning tabs and keys, I found it is best to follow up right away with an old dry cotton Tee shirt.

[Silken Path]

Hehe - It's the green panel Pampers wipes. I don't think they have Aloe in these - they're hypoallergenic. I get the large 3-pack refills for less than $8 at Wally World and put them in the expensive plastic pop-up box.

I have some minor problems that I haven't addressed on the organ, but they're not deal-breakers.

* The AC meter on the Whind machine is stuck. It does not respond to tapping and the zero adjustment is tighter than I want to mess with. I need to get a meter in there and see if I'm getting around the 9 VAC it's supposed to impart. (The B+ is fine - I tried starting the organ with the Whind machine disconnected, and there was no keying. This proves that it actually DOES get getting from it.)

* The Tremolo does not work at all. It's supposed to come back to the organ using the same red cable that B+ does. I may have it on the wrong terminals below (but I don't THINK so).

* One of the amps is a little noisy. It's not bad at normal levels. It also makes a SWOOSH when it powers down.

That $200 (cost new) speaker with the four cheap drivers in it really does produce some bass. The 32' Contrabombarde is barely audible at low C, put it picks up toward the end of the octave.

My bottom is a little sore/creased today, but the height above the pedals is perfect for me. My foot skims over the whites and the blacks are just a tap away. (Now that I have all these pedals and have resolved not to pump the gas, I really should find something to do with the other octave and a half and my right foot. I mostly play hymns. Anyway, that can come later and in another thread.)

[Larrytow]

Your TC-4 has a 32' Contra Bombarde !? They sure did change things on that model over the years. Mine only had a 16' Bassoon if I'm recalling correctly.

Even though the lowest octave may be weak on that 32', it can be useful in the upper portion of the range. Good for playing the hymn melody line while your hands are playing the rest of it. Works nice for big hymn introductions.

[toodles]

Nearly 100% of commerical wood finishes are lacquer. Might even be 100% but I allows for possibilities.

The result is that the only common chemicals that will dissolve the finish are lacquer thinner and acetone, so it is safe to use mineral spirits and naptha to remove gunk off the finish without damaging the finish.

[Silken Path]

Your TC-4 has a 32' Contra Bombarde !? They sure did change things on that model over the years. Mine only had a 16' Bassoon if I'm recalling correctly.

Even though the lowest octave may be weak on that 32', it can be useful in the upper portion of the range. Good for playing the hymn melody line while your hands are playing the rest of it. Works nice for big hymn introductions.

My mistake. It's a Contra Diapason - the Bombarde is a 16. (It also has Bombarde 8 in the Swell.) I was wondering what the low point of audibility is for us old fahts. The Rodgers has an 8-16-32 Reed, but I think the circuit protects the woofer and it fades out at the low end. I also have a Sunfire Carver sub-woofer, but it sounds like jeans flapping on a clothesline if I try to go that far down with the Rodgers attached. That's why I was so pleasantly surprised with the big woofers on the Allen, especially since the were one-half to one-third the price of the other speakers circa 1963.

The '59 has "Resultant 32" as the lowest stop.

Nearly 100% of commercial wood finishes are lacquer. Might even be 100% but I allows for possibilities.

The result is that the only common chemicals that will dissolve the finish are lacquer thinner and acetone, so it is safe to use mineral spirits and naptha to remove gunk off the finish without damaging the finish.

Thanks, Toodles - That's good to know. Larry got me looking at my silly Pampers wipes, and they have weak citric acid in them. I have some Olde English to try on the organ, but I'm really curious about the Fornby's. I see the furniture/antique forums talking about it.

In the other thread here where they were discussing organ "quality" I saw where some soul made reference to a page where some writer was saying that Allens are finished inside and out. This one was, and so were the speakers.

[Silken Path]

We has vibrato!

I sat down and studied the different diagrams for the Whind machines, none of which are exactly the model my '67 has. Then I went and looked at the thing. It says "Adjust to 9 VAC" on the front, but the analog training guide says ignore that and use 6 VAC. Tweaking around the pot behind it did nothing. Then I noticed the pot on the other side. Tweaked it a little, and the meter suddenly started working. Also saw the blower light on the organ start flashing.

Now it's a matter of tweaking the Rate and Depth settings until it sounds best with vibrato on. (One can certainly make it sound pretty bad with the controls.)

So the vibrato is a little bit of AC superimposed on the keying voltage and it comes to the organ piggy-tailing on the B+ through the red cable and using ONLY the 4-pin connector.

I can get a steady 5 VAC indicated and the needle begins to swing as the depth setting is moved. Somebody marked red positions on "Rate Adjust" and "Amplitude Adjust" and RMW was on Medium.

I don't think it's working exactly RIGHT, as the toggle switch has to be on "More" RMW to get the voltage indication up, but it's audible with the meter down low and barely bumping.

It doesn't sound like much like my notion of vibrato. (My Thomas Trianon's vibrato was luscious when it worked. It also doesn't sound like vibrato on the European organs in Hauptwerk or on my 1999 Rodgers.)

But it sounds like some kind of vibrato, and it works with the reeds and diapasons as well as the flutes.

This part was easy. It took more time to enter this than to "fix" it.

[Kurzweil]

Thanks - that's generous. How large are they? I may be able to request to Admin to host them. He can be pretty reasonable.

The service manual itself is two fifty page sections plus a cover. Not sure why I scanned the cover as a separate document; maybe the format - it has the first three pages. Part 1 is 3.6 Meg and part 2 is 4.1 M.

I have three other manuals from the 1967 Allen:
Analog Pre-Training Primer - 3.8 M
Service Manual - Systems 0.4 M (already attached to an earlier post in this thread)
Service Manual - Devtronix Vibrato - 1.2 M
Incidentally, I may actually still have a vibrato board. No knowledge of how well they worked. Mine had three gyros.

[toodles]

1. There is no vibrato on these Allens except via the gyrophonic projector; the effect provided is tremolo, which is an amplitude modulation and vibrato is frequency modulation. Don't expect it to sound like your Thomas vibrato. Rodgers organs up until they changed to digital tone generation all had vibrato, though they called it tremulant--a very few Rodgers models also included some amplitude modulation with the FM. Vibrato generally sounds warmer than tremolo to most people, but pipes actually have an effect that is much more like tremolo than vibrato. Most digital organs emulate pipe sound, so they will sound more like tremolo.

2. Don't try the "Old English" or the Formby's. Old English can soak into the grain of the wood through scratches in the finish, and make a real mess. Formby's is actually a stripper and unless you want to do a complete refinish, it'll make a mess for you, too. First remove all wax, dirt, grime, and gunk with mineral spirits and naptha--Ronsonol lighter fluid is a convenient way to buy small amounts of naptha. After you are down to the lacquer finish, then you can see if you really need to refinish. If you do, lacquer thinner and 00 steel wool are the best ways to do it and go slowly in a very well ventilated area.

[Silken Path]

You've educated me a little more. Thank you. Tremolo it is (and it actually says Tremolo on the organ.)

The Formby's I was looking at wasn't the stripper - it's the cleaner - supposedly dissolves the old wax build-up. I just cancelled the order (thank you!) and changed it to 12 oz of Ronsonal lighter fuel. Should be here via ground on Wednesday or so. Ventilation is no problem - the organ is just inside a garage door.

The Tremolo doesn't sound very good. It alters the sound of the Diapason + Celeste negatively, so I wouldn't use it with that combination. It might be like the old hair gel commercial - a little dab will do you.

[toodles]

The key with most finishing and wood care products is to know what is in them--if the label doesn't say, don't use it. Generally you can just go get a can of mineral spirits at the hardware store/Home Depot/Lowe's and pay a small fraction of the price of some of the name brand stuff.

By the way, the issue with lacquer thinner is that it is extremely volatile--it evaporates really quickly. All of these cleaners should be used with good ventilation, but lacquer thinner, acetone, and methylene chloride are especially dangerous fumes. Methylene chloride can cause cardiac problems,

The tremolo if properly adjusted should sound OK--about like a pipe organ trem. It won't be "lush" like a vibrato can be, but can be pleasing. I avoid using trem with celestes--the amplitude beats and celeste beats seem to work against each other.