Dear John McClure,  I saw your post today about using an accordion for
automatic playing.  At this moment I am building a roller organ that
can use accordion reeds or harmonica reed plates.

An accordion has two reeds for each note, one works when the accordion
is being squeezed and the other works when the accordion is being
pulled apart.  When a button is pushed a chamber opens up to two reeds.

There is a leather check valve on each reed.  The leather check valves
allows the air to only go through one reed at a time.  So as the bel-
lows is pushed in and out the air only goes to one of the reeds in the
chamber.  So if you are using an accordion for the project, you can go
with a vacuum or pressure system or a combination of both.  There are
several good sites on the Internet that show accordions, squeeze boxes
and button boxes.

If you use an accordion the size of the unit will be quite small
compared to a player piano.  I have but one warning when it comes to
build a player anything, expect many hours for construction time.
I would also like to see the set of plans you are talking about.

John Conrad Kleinbauer
Kleinbauer@juno.com