Mechanical Music Digest  Archives
You Are Not Logged In Login/Get New Account
Please Log In. Accounts are free!
Logged In users are granted additional features including a more current version of the Archives and a simplified process for submitting articles.
Home Archives Calendar Gallery Store Links Info
MMD > Archives > September 1997 > 1997.09.25 > 10Prev  Next


Variable-alignment Roll-tracking System
By Dick Merchant

(A close encounter with a tracking system of the third kind!)  Before we
get away from tracking systems, I would like to run this by the folks
reading MMD.

Years ago, 25 or 30, I came across a player having a tracking system
having a roller -- maybe two of them, above or below the tracker bar and
the length of the tracker bar -- that would push the roll slightly
further from the tracker bar on one end or the other in response to being
too far to the right or left, instead of laterally shifting the roll or
the tracker bar.  Seems like the roller was maybe a quarter to
five-eighths inch in diameter.

The operating principle seems to be that since roll frame misalignment
will cause a roll to creep to one side, then a variable roll frame
alignment device can be used as a tracking system.  I just saw the thing
briefly somewhere, didn't take notes or pictures or anything, and can't
even remember now if it was a player piano or an orchestrion of some kind.
I seems like it wasn't a U.S.-made machine.

Does anybody know anything about this type of tracking system?

Dick Merchant
Carlsbad, NM

 [ The printing industry surely experimented with all sorts of devices
 [ to control the tracking of the paper 'web' as it moves through the
 [ banks of a large high-speed printing machine.  Perhaps this is one
 [ of those devices.  -- Robbie


(Message sent Thu 25 Sep 1997, 05:32:22 GMT, from time zone GMT-0600.)

Key Words in Subject:  Roll-tracking, System, Variable-alignment

Home    Archives    Calendar    Gallery    Store    Links    Info   


Enter text below to search the MMD Website with Google



CONTACT FORM: Click HERE to write to the editor, or to post a message about Mechanical Musical Instruments to the MMD

Unless otherwise noted, all opinions are those of the individual authors and may not represent those of the editors. Compilation copyright 1995-2024 by Jody Kravitz.

Please read our Republication Policy before copying information from or creating links to this web site.

Click HERE to contact the webmaster regarding problems with the website.

Please support publication of the MMD by donating online

Please Support Publication of the MMD with your Generous Donation

Pay via PayPal

No PayPal account required

                                     
Translate This Page