When I was still punching John Smith organ rolls by hand, I needed a
way to scan the finished roll so that I could edit it and then print
out new masters for punching.  The original masters from Melvyn Wright
soon became tatters as they were used over and over again.

I built a 20-note chest with pouches and lifter disks much the same as
a primary chest on a player piano.  I used video game button switches
since they were gold plated and I knew they would last a long time and
would give reliable make and break signals.

Richard Brandle assisted me in connecting the Octet Designs UM-1
controller (from MIDIator) and wrote software to record the off-on
signals from the switch contacts.  Once I had the scan information,
I could manipulate it any way I wanted to as far as correcting wrong
notes, perforations that were too long, etc.  Another program allowed
me to send this information to my dot matrix printer which made new
masters.

The original hand perforated roll is read by a tracker bar and the
paper is pulled over the bar by a constant speed motor at about 1.5
feet per minute.  I had very good results with this simple device which
now stands vacant.  All of the information for the automatic perforator
has been converted to Wayne Stahnke's WEB format files using the scan
information from the switches.

Theoretically one could make an 88-note scanner from a set of Ampico
or Standard Pneumatic primaries.  As far as switches are concerned,
phosphor bronze and silver make an excellent match.  Both are available
from Organ Supply Industries.

You can see pictures of the pneumatic portion of the reader at
http://www.txdirect.net/~egaida/rollrdr.html

Ed Gaida
egaida@txdirect.net