but here is what the eminent English organist, W. T. Best, said about tubular pneumatic action as applied to another organ used for concert purposes: "It is a complete failure; you cannot play a triplet on the Trumpet, and I consider it the most d——nable invention ever placed inside an organ." Notwithstanding these drawbacks this action became very fashionable after its demonstration at St. Paul's, and was used even in small organs in preference to the Barker lever. One builder confessed to the writer that he had suffered severe financial loss through installing this action. After expending considerable time (and time is money) in getting it to work right, the whole thing would be upset when the sexton started up the heating apparatus. The writer is acquainted with organs in New York City where these same conditions prevail.
The writer, however, will admit having seen some tubular actions which were fairly satisfactory, one in particular in the factory of Alfred Monk, London, England, where for demonstration purposes the tubes were fifty feet long. Dr. Bédart informs us that Puget, the famous organ builder of Toulouse, France, sets fifty feet as the limit of usefulness of this action.
Henry Willis & Sons in their description of the organ in the Lady Chapel of Liverpool Cathedral state that their action has been tested to a repetition of 1,000 per minute, quicker than any human finger can move. This is a square organ in one case, but we note they have adopted the electric action for the great cathedral organ where the distance of the pipes from the keys is too great for satisfactory response.
In view of the wide use at present of this action we give a drawing and description of its operation as patented and made by Mr. J. J. Binns, of Bramley, Leeds, England. J. Matthews, in his "Handbook of the Organ," says that this action is very good and free from drawbacks.
Fig. 5. Tubular Pneumatic Action
The tubes, N, from each key are fixed to the hole connected to the small puffs P in the puff-board E. Air under pressure is admitted by the key action and conveyed by the tubes N which raises the corresponding button valves S1, lifting their spindles S and closing the apertures T2 in the bottom of the wind-chest A, and opening a similar aperture T in the bottom of the cover-board F, causing the compressed air to escape from the exhaust bellows M, which closes, raising the solid valve H in the cover-board F and closing the aperture J1 in the wind-chest A, shuts off the air from the bellows, which immediately closes, drawing down the pallet B, which admits air (or wind) to the pipes.
No tubular-pneumatic action is entirely satisfactory when the distance between the keys and the organ is great. This is often due to a law of nature rather than to imperfection of design or workmanship.
Pneumatic pulses travel slowly—at a speed which does not reach 1,100 feet per second. In large organs where necessarily some of the tubes are short and some have to be long, it is impossible to secure simultaneous speech from all departments of the instrument, and in addition to this the crisp feeling of direct connection with his pipes, which the old tracker action secured for the organist, is lost.