Notes and scales and reeds, oh my!

Hi All,  The following information is for future builders of mechani-
cal instruments.  I was seeking accordion reeds for my roller organ
project.  Before plucking down over three hundred dollars for reeds at
HMT (House of Musical Tradition) I contacted Edward Schmidt to see what
set of reeds (note wise) I should buy.  Ed told me monkey organs made
today use the following scale.  I could use the same notes used by a
Gem Cob Organ, but then again I am making Son of Cob, so it is my
choice.

  G,C,D,E,F,F#,G,A,B,Middle C,D,E,F,F#,G,A,B,C,D,E

During this time I became concerned if there was enough room on my
design to fit all 20 reeds.  I wrote HMT only to find they did not know
the approximate size of accordion reeds.  HMT was the only accordion
site on the Internet to answer my E-mails now I had to start over!

A new campaign of letter writing started.  This time I ventured into
the realm of "Button Boxes" and concertinas.  Here I found a group of
people who still know how things work and how they are made!  Unlike
the accordion people, the button box and concertina people all answered
my E-mails.  I had to keep notes on the side just to remember who was
who!  I was told that the width of the reeds in the treble range is
between .645 to .651.  I was also given the size for pump organ reeds
and more.

I asked one of the people for a source of reeds and I was given the
name of a man in Canada.  When I called the man he knew exactly what I
was doing.  My only blunder was, I knew what notes I wanted but I did
not realize an accordion has several instruments: sax, tenor, piccolo,
etc.  I also found out the reeds were only $3.00 each plus tuning,
leathering and shipping.  I was told by several people who I wrote to
that the prices at HMT were way out of line.

Please check out the follow people on the net who have helped me!

Ed Schmidt: Sells and arranges music rolls (he gave me the scale)
    http://www.actionwebcreations.com/smr/

Harold Herrington: Sells and makes concertinas (he gave me sizes
and source for reeds)  http://www.concertinas.com/

John Conrad Kleinbauer
Kleinbauer@juno.com

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