I did a job a few years ago in a theatre that was having its (listed) organ renovated. It was a glorious machine that rose from the floor and allegedly sang like an angel.
anyway it transpired that the air pump could not be saved, and as the pump itself wasn't listed they decided to comision a new one. they built a special room to house it that was supposed to hide the quite considerable noise that the new pump made.
when they tested it however the noise was so bad from the pump that they decided to get a specialist acoustic engineer in to quieten it.
some months later he presented his scheme for silencing the pump and of course his bill for the consultancy.
his proposals went through the system and eventualy he had to present his solution to the board - his proposal included massive doors to the room, anti vibration flooring and acoustic dampers for the mounts, even the walls were covered in an acoustic deadening surface, finally some state of the art attenuators to prevent the sound from travelling along the pipes.
then some one with an eye on the budget picked up the fact that the attenuators accounted for the vast majority of the budget.
when he was questioned about it he pointed out that 'there were an awful lot of them'
that was when the penny dropped - It seems the acoustic specialist had worked out the special requirements to silence every single one of the organ pipes.
gotta give him credit for being thorough.
anyway it transpired that the air pump could not be saved, and as the pump itself wasn't listed they decided to comision a new one. they built a special room to house it that was supposed to hide the quite considerable noise that the new pump made.
when they tested it however the noise was so bad from the pump that they decided to get a specialist acoustic engineer in to quieten it.
some months later he presented his scheme for silencing the pump and of course his bill for the consultancy.
his proposals went through the system and eventualy he had to present his solution to the board - his proposal included massive doors to the room, anti vibration flooring and acoustic dampers for the mounts, even the walls were covered in an acoustic deadening surface, finally some state of the art attenuators to prevent the sound from travelling along the pipes.
then some one with an eye on the budget picked up the fact that the attenuators accounted for the vast majority of the budget.
when he was questioned about it he pointed out that 'there were an awful lot of them'
that was when the penny dropped - It seems the acoustic specialist had worked out the special requirements to silence every single one of the organ pipes.
gotta give him credit for being thorough.
