Windversorgung 19. Jahrhundert

Karsten, Samstag, 05. Januar 2013, 13:54 (vor 5040 Tagen) @ CamilVH
bearbeitet von Karsten, Samstag, 05. Januar 2013, 14:25

Wie, wo und wann vollzog sich der Übergang von der mechanischen zur elektrischen Windversorgung bei Orgeln? Ich glaube mich zu erinnern vor vielen Jahren mal gelesen zu haben, dass Bruckner in London 1859 auf einer mit Dampf betriebenen Orgel gespielt haben soll. Gab es das auch in Deutschland? Welche Orgelbauer haben Dampfmotoren verwendet, bzw. welche Alternativen gab es? Welche bedeutenden Instrumente wurden gleich mit Motoren ausgestattet? Merseburg sicher nicht, aber vielleicht Schwerin? Wie war es bei Walcker?

Ich erlaube mir, ausführlich und in Originalsprache aus William Leslie Sumners "The Organ - Its evolution, principles of construction and use" (4. Auflage, 1973) zu zitieren (S. 356ff). Natürlich nicht "up to date" und auf Großbritannien bezogen, aber die grundlegenden Verläufe werden vorgestellt:

Early in the nineteenth Century, water mains, which were becoming common in England and in favourable circumstances were capable of supplying water at a pressure of 30 Ib. per square in., were used to actuate blowing cylinders which moved the bellows feeders.
Large Instruments of the mid- and later nineteenth-century, such as those at the Alexandra Palace, London, and St. George's Hall, Liverpool, were blown by steam power, and Henry Willis invented large-diameter blowing cylinders to replace the bellows feeders. Such a method of blowing was obviously inconvenient to an Organist requiring the use of the instrument at short notice.
The early hydraulic engines which did not differ greatly in design from steam cylinders were crude and jerky in action, but between 1860 and 1870 David Joy, a Middlesbrough engineer, devised a "fluid-driven slide valve", which was a great improvement. The device could be attached to existing feeders, if necessary, and the rising reservoir could readily be made to regulate the supply of water. Even today when the hydraulic blower has practically vanished from English organs, it is still found in some places in America where the churches are exempt from water rates! In London and a few other places hydraulic power became available at 750-1,000 Ib. per square inch, and this was used occasionally for organ-blowing. For a time two tiny blowing cylinders, with mechanism devised by Mr. Vincent Willis, were used in the organ of St. Paul's Cathedral, London. Gas engines became popular in many parts of the world in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. When a gas engine was used for organ-blowing, the plant had to be set up at some distance from the organ and in a special chamber, usually outside the building in which the organ stood. Many organs were ruined, over a period of years, by the action of oil and gas fumes sucked in with the air of the blower and delivered to the organ. This, of course, could be avoided by a proper arrangement of the blowing apparatus, but it occurred quite often and much damage was done, in particular, to the leather of the pneumatic action.
Mains electricity is now almost universally employed for organ-blowing. At first, electric motors drove the feeders of the "bellows" by worm and pinion gear, but later the old leather feeders were rendered obsolete by supplying air from centrifugal compressors directly to the reservoirs. Fans rotating in an airtight casing and driven by electric motors had been used for blowing blast and other furnaces from 1880 or before, and Robert Hope-Jones used a similar device for blowing the organ in St. John's Church, Birkenhead, in 1887. The rotary fan was improved in 1902 by R. A. and L. B. Cousans, of Lincoln, who introduced the Kinetic blower. This worked at the relatively slow speed of 1,000-1,400 revolutions per minute and was coupled directly to the electric motor. The principle of the multi-stage fan was that air which was thrown from the periphery of a fan and thus compressed was taken by ducts to the centre of the next fan on the same spindle: thus each fan increased the pressure by l 1/2 in. or 2 in. of wind. The pressure wind could be tapped off at any stage and piped to appropriate reservoirs. Blowers are made so that they adjust their power automatically to the wind which is being taken from them. Moreover, even large plants can be started and stopped by simple push-button control at the organ console and the starting rheostat is actuated automatically. It was customary to drive the low-voltage dynamo (14-15 volts), which supplied current for the organ action, by a belt from the blowing motor. Organ-blowing plants for the smallest Organs can be obtained in insulated boxes, so that they may be placed within the organ itself, outside the instrument and in the church, or even above the pipes of the great organ, and yet no noise is apparent in the building. There is now no longer any need to endure noisy organ-blowing plants.

Konnte Reger immer mit Elektromotoren rechnen?

Reger hat, glaube ich, mit gar nichts "gerechnet". Der schrieb einfach rücksichtslos wie er nicht anders konnte. ;)

Gruß
Karsten