Friday, June 26, 2009

foot pedals


At some point I saw these wonderful photos of a very early Moog that lives at the University Of Michigan. I was very taken with the early pedals that seemed so slapped together, in fact I was so much so that I began asking around to see if anyone had a set of pedals to sell.

From what I had seen the early systems had two different types of pedals. There were the ones pictured and another style that not only went up and down but sideways as well. This was somewhere in between an early stompbox design that I have an example of, which controlled volume and tone and the Wonka elevator.

While buying some panels from a nice gentleman named Bill, I did the logical thing and shot off a note about the few Moog parts I was still after.

It turned out Bill had a few of these pedals raw and loose. No mounting, no instructions but some valuable information instead. Bill was able to tell me that they were common of a lot of organs, much like the Pratt-Reed keyboard that Moog also used. He thought that they had been manufactured by Allen.

A short time later I received a strange E-mail telling me of a shipment. Shortly the explanation followed. Bill had generously sent me the pedals. I was thrilled and nervous because I had no idea how I was going to get them to work.

After some attempts to get an actual diagram or something from some Moog experts I know failed, I decided to just go for it. Tonight they work again, pitch control and groovy detuning at very reasonable voltage ranges. Yeah, I used a meter because I wasn't going to blow anything up.

Here's my reproduction.