Greetings,  I recently went through a long search for a replacement
for a PPCo air blower, which was very loud even after installing new
brushes and bearings.  I found a suitable replacement in the "Ultra
9000" spa blower from "Air Supply Florida."  It produces 105 CFM and
"sealed pressure" of 65 inches water column, it's small enough to
easily fit in the bottom of the case, and is wonderfully quiet.

At first, it was far more than enough -- way far, so I took the
speed controller from the PPCo blower and applied it to the Ultra.
It worked like a charm, and the manufacturer told me that such a
thing was quite safe, and slowing it down made it even quieter.

The blower motor is rated for 800 hours and could probably be run
continuously.  Since it only runs when the build-up orchestrion
is playing, I doubt I'll be needing to update the brushes in any
reasonable future.  I got mine from Amazon.  More info here:
http://www.airsupplyflorida.com/products/ultra-9000/ 

Anyway, I wanted to report this as I know there are probably other
folks looking for build-up orchestrion pipe blowers.  This Ultra
spa blower would probably be perfect for a calliope as well.

George Bogatko
bogatko-ecom@comcast.net.geentroep [delete ".geentroep" to reply]