Hi All,  Reid Paul Echandia <rpejcnj@aol.com> sent me a few pictures
in an effort to determine which player mechanism is in his Needham
player piano.

According to the reference books I have, Needham used the Standard
action.  However, from the pictures he sent, the mechanism is not a
Standard.  I realize that very few manufacturers ever produced "tubing
diagrams" for their units.  I suppose the thinking was that they were
simple enough as not to be necessary.  Situations like Reid's show that
such diagrams would indeed be valuable to the novice rebuilder who
doesn't have enough experience to be able to figure out the function of
the various devices and valve blocks in the unit.

I've created one diagram for the Lauter-Humana, which can be confusing
if all the tubes are broken or missing.  I recently added a new page at
Player-Care (a little more for fun than for necessity) which contains
the diagram.  It's at:

  http://www.player-care.com/anfindex.html

What I'd like to suggest to all player rebuilders is a joint effort to
produce as many tubing diagrams (basic layout) for as many mechanisms
as possible and then make them available via the MMD web site.  I've
also attached the diagram of the Lauter-Humana to start the process.

Musically,

John A. Tuttle

 [ I had to search a bit to locate the URL of the Lauer-Humana
 [ drawing: it's at  http://www.player-care.com/lauter.gif
 [ Besides tubing connections the drawing also indicates the
 [ connection of some of the mechanical elements.  I will
 [ establish a page at the MMD tech site to collect diagrams
 [ and drawings like this -- it's a good idea, John!  -- Robbie