Perforated Paper Project
Here's a player piano roll from my collection in the process of being rolled onto a new core. The roll shown is Supreme Word Roll No.6218 (price 75 cents), titled "Panama Twilight", played by Anna Allen, copyright 1922... A.J.Stasny, Music Co; Supreme Music Company, Newark, NJ.
The black item on the paper is the broken Bakelite slotted drive spindle end cap of the roll that was damaged. This Bakelite end is glued into a cardboard tube... the core onto which the perforated paper roll is wound. The end cap at the opposite end of the roll is just press fitted into the core and can be removed. Both ends fit onto spindles in the roll mounting "box" on the piano. The right end cap is slotted to receive a small drive extension, similar to a very short screwdriver blade, found on the right spindle of the piano. In large lots of piano rolls it's not unusual to find Bakelite end caps that are broken... almost always the right (slotted) end. The roll can still be played, but the jagged portion of the broken area can damage the roll edge, especially during rewinding.
The operation here began with finding a "damaged beyond repair" (shredded) piano roll having the same core ends and stripping off the old perforated paper. Then its core tube with undamaged ends is reused. The paper from the roll with the damaged end cap is VERY carefully removed by winding it around a small cardboard tube or, as in this case... a small roll of Kraft paper. When the end of the roll is reached, it's carefully detached, then lined up and taped onto the replacement core. Then it's rewound onto that core very carefully, watching the alignment as you feed it onto the core so the end caps don't tear the edges. The paper, being a century old, and quite fragile due the multitude of perforations, can be torn easily, turning what was once a nice piano roll into a shredded messy heap of large confetti. The process doesn't take very long... the job can be completed in as little as ten minutes. The time consuming part is finding a junk roll from which to salvage a good core with end caps.
How were many end caps damaged? Player pianos provided entertainment at parties... where alcoholic beverages were served, even during Prohibition. A boozed up attendee with impaired manual dexterity would fumble the process of mounting the roll on the spindles of the roll box, dumping the roll onto the floor. Most often they would hit drive-spindle end first, that end being the "nose of the rocket" in its trajectory to impact with the floor.
DSC-2946H
Perforated Paper Project
Here's a player piano roll from my collection in the process of being rolled onto a new core. The roll shown is Supreme Word Roll No.6218 (price 75 cents), titled "Panama Twilight", played by Anna Allen, copyright 1922... A.J.Stasny, Music Co; Supreme Music Company, Newark, NJ.
The black item on the paper is the broken Bakelite slotted drive spindle end cap of the roll that was damaged. This Bakelite end is glued into a cardboard tube... the core onto which the perforated paper roll is wound. The end cap at the opposite end of the roll is just press fitted into the core and can be removed. Both ends fit onto spindles in the roll mounting "box" on the piano. The right end cap is slotted to receive a small drive extension, similar to a very short screwdriver blade, found on the right spindle of the piano. In large lots of piano rolls it's not unusual to find Bakelite end caps that are broken... almost always the right (slotted) end. The roll can still be played, but the jagged portion of the broken area can damage the roll edge, especially during rewinding.
The operation here began with finding a "damaged beyond repair" (shredded) piano roll having the same core ends and stripping off the old perforated paper. Then its core tube with undamaged ends is reused. The paper from the roll with the damaged end cap is VERY carefully removed by winding it around a small cardboard tube or, as in this case... a small roll of Kraft paper. When the end of the roll is reached, it's carefully detached, then lined up and taped onto the replacement core. Then it's rewound onto that core very carefully, watching the alignment as you feed it onto the core so the end caps don't tear the edges. The paper, being a century old, and quite fragile due the multitude of perforations, can be torn easily, turning what was once a nice piano roll into a shredded messy heap of large confetti. The process doesn't take very long... the job can be completed in as little as ten minutes. The time consuming part is finding a junk roll from which to salvage a good core with end caps.
How were many end caps damaged? Player pianos provided entertainment at parties... where alcoholic beverages were served, even during Prohibition. A boozed up attendee with impaired manual dexterity would fumble the process of mounting the roll on the spindles of the roll box, dumping the roll onto the floor. Most often they would hit drive-spindle end first, that end being the "nose of the rocket" in its trajectory to impact with the floor.
DSC-2946H