Someone asked about RAM in the last couple of days. It is Ragtime
Automated Music, 4218 Jessup Rd, Ceres, California 95307, phone (209)
667-5525, fax (209) 634-2667. Ken Caulkins is the owner. He has designed a
plastic unit pneumatic which snaps onto a 1/2" steel rod (secured with a
self-tapping screw). The pneumatics make up into a two deck stack, the
steel rods slipping into plastic mounting plates that screw to the cheek
blocks.

Caulkins seems to be a very clever designer who has relied on plastic for
just about everything you could imagine, from the spoolbox to pipes &
pipe valves. He sells kits for converting any piano to an O roll coin
piano or orchestrion & a series of "calliopes" & "band organs" which use
the pipes & play from O rolls. He recently added reed pipes to the line.

For about $4,000 retail, you can get the complete basic kit, snare drum,
bass drum, tambourine, cymbal, a set of bells & a coin receiver, or you
can purchase all of that stuffed into a piano for about $9,000, depending
upon the style & wood of the case.

I was skeptical about such heavy reliance on plastic, but a kit can be
installed in a day's time & will churn out quite a satisfactory
performance. The spoolbox & drums mount beneath the keybed with bells,
pipes & other stuff going upstairs. Doing it that way, they can get by
with only minor case modification or none at all.

I have a couple of their kits installed with the spoolbox centered on the
music shelf & percussion tucked in on either side. Doing it that way,
however, means that the case must be extended to provide the necessary
room. It all makes into a pretty nifty little orchestrion.

Hope this provides you with some of the necessary info.¶
Stan Rhine