Organ History
Built in 1927 by Geo. Fincham & Sons, the organ was rebuilt in 1958 by Hill, Norman & Beard. Sixty-five years after the last rebuild, the organ was beginning to show its age: some leathers were perishing, affecting the function and efficiency of stop actions and other components; and the old blower, being located outside and so drawing climatically inconsistent air, was causing tuning instability and accelerated deterioration in timber and perishable componentry inside the organ.
The Great stop action refurbished and reinstalled. Inset: the action in disrepair.
Great and Swell Stop Actions
To bring the Great and Swell drawstop units up to a good working order the units were removed to our workshop, stripped, re-leathered, and re-gasketed.
Façade Note Action
The facade note actions had developed wear and tear related faults due to their advanced age, making the action unreliable – some notes of the Great Open Diapason had were ciphering and some had completely stopped playing. Correcting this required the removal of the facade windchests to our Melbourne workshop, where we refurbished and cleaned the windchests throughout, returning them to reliable operation.
Upgrade to Blower
The long-awaited replacement of the aged blower afforded the opportunity to install a new custom-made pipe organ blower in an internal silencing cabinet housed in the bell tower. The advantage of the blower’s relocation to inside the bell tower, drawing air from inside the church, means that the air supply is now the same temperature and humidity as the timber and leather components in the organ.
