Vox Continental I Problem

[Ray_Manzarek]

OK i understand, So basically we need to check all wiring for their weld quality but were nothing (from what we see on the actual pictures) to ad.

So basically. on my first video you can see that My IV drawbar send a single tone to all the key instead of four. So its more possible that the trouble should be between the tone generator to the key contact? Because the IV buss bar is sending a tone from the drawbar itself.

The thing i have pain to understand is, where the four tone of the IV are coming from, the tone generator? those 4 wire to each contact are coming from different tone generator?

[52 Bill]

The thing i have pain to understand is, where the four tone of the IV are coming from, the tone generator? those 4 wire to each contact are coming from different tone generator?

The additional tones are wired to the key contacts from the other keys, which come from the 12 tone generator boards.

Once you lift the keyboard assembly, you may find that the original wires are still there, but just disconnected from the key contacts.

I think that all of those wires are bundled together, so it would be difficult to remove them from the organ without replacing the entire wiring loom.

The IV mix contact for a C key would have 2 octaves of the C note along with a G note and an E note.

[Ray_Manzarek]

Ok tomorrow ill go take more pictures of the key contact card. Well see what's goon on by there

[Ray_Manzarek]

OK here we are, after much verification on all contact, i can tell that i suppose the problem is on the wiring. I verified all contact one by one and all IV contact only have one wire weld on them.

Theres the wire setup and photo for help)

All 16’ are red for all keys
All 8’ are green for all keys
All 4’ are light grey for all keys
The IV go like this
- 1st key (lower sound) wire Black
- Keys 2 to 14 are blue wires
- Keys 15 to 26 are purple wires
- Keys 27 to36 are black wires
- Keys 37 to 49 are blue wires

I noticed that those wires are goin to some of the tone generator (see pictures). We saw on the vox showroom documents thats the mixture tabs are made of 4 diffferent note, so now we must know from which tone generator to which key contact

[Ray_Manzarek]

[52 Bill]

Well, I wouldn't have thought that someone would actually remove the wire loom for the IV mix notes, but that seems to be the case. Like I said, People Are Strange. The original wire loom would have been carefully "laced" with waxed cord like the other one is. The wires that someone has added looks like it has been taped in a few places. I imagine the new wires were added just to make the IV buss make some sound, to fool someone into thinking that it was working.

Underneath the 12, note generator boards are a row of vertical isolation resistor pc boards. There should be 84 of them, one for every note on the organ. All of the missing wires would have been connected to these boards. If you look at these boards, some will have only 2-3 resistors and some will have 7-8 resistors. See if all of the boards are still there and see if the original resistors are still there.

While not impossible, this will be a very slow process to replace the missing wires.

[52 Bill]

There should be 84 of them, one for every note on the organ.

I checked the schematic, there should be 85 of these "Biscuits" not 84. There is an additional "A" note board for the highest frequency.

While not impossible, this will be a very slow process to replace the missing wires.

There are 49 keys on the organ. Each key has an IV contact that requires 4 wires.

49 X 4 = 196 wires. These wires need to run from the isolation boards to the key contacts. The original wires were Black (2 2/3'), Yellow (2'), Mauve (1 3/5') and Blue (1').

[Ray_Manzarek]

Do you have this specific schematic for wiring them? i could buy it, my tech would repair it very easily with a wiring plan.

[Ray_Manzarek]

That may sound a bit stupid but this organ is one of my holy grail! i really want to see it getting back to life!

[52 Bill]

Do you have this specific schematic for wiring them? i could buy it, my tech would repair it very easily with a wiring plan.

As far as I know, there is no complete wiring diagram for this loom and the isolator biscuits. The schematic shows typical connections.

Is your tech experienced with working on organs and key wiring? If he is, then he should be able to figure it out from the schematics. Or it may be possible to find a used wiring loom from a parts organ.

I know that if it was my own organ, I would want to fix it too.

[Ray_Manzarek]

yeah hes a specialist on organ, hes an accreditated Hammond tech, but the Vox Continental is the first he saw, ill see it on friday and we will figured it out

many thanks ill keep this thread updated, i may have more question lol

do you own yourself a Continental that i can see the wiring, don't need to see the entire wire, but would be helpfull to see by example (note #1 start from G tone generator pin # 1(upper) etc, for the IV only) we could figure a plan thogeter and i may making a good drawing (I'm a graphic designer) and i could make it public for everyone

[52 Bill]

do you own yourself a Continental that i can see the wiring,

I do have one, but it is an American made V301H. The wiring looks different.

I have scanned the schematic for the main wiring plan. If your tech is Hammond certified for tone wheel organs, then he should be able to figure out what needs to be done from this diagram.

It explains to:
Connect the 2 2/3' black wiring from biscuits #53-#5 to the IV contacts of keys #1-#49.
Connect the 2' yellow wiring from biscuits #48-#A to key contacts of keys #1-#49.
Connect the 1 3/5' Mauve wiring from biscuits #44-#1 to keys #1-#44.
Connect the 1' Blue wiring from biscuits #36-#A to keys #1-#37.

The drawing also shows the biscuits and which ones have which resistors and where each color wire connects to each of the biscuits.

[Ray_Manzarek]

Ok i think with all this were gonna be on the good way, you and my tech are speaking the same language, but for myself im a newbie at all this and i have to traslate everything for him, so, each time you explained me something, he understanded it at the first time, but i took a hard time to translate everything, ill keep you updated!

Many thank buddy, i really really really appreciate, I'm happy to see some helpful people!!

[Ray_Manzarek]

The plan you provide me is totally the key to solve yhe problem, everything is clear. I'm totally ease to do it myself, what im gonna do is remove all the actual IV wires and restart to new, with the good color. Will be a long process but not so complicated.

With a bit smaller wire than the one used originally, that my tech suggest me, ill start one nkte to see if it works then ill go for the adventure, ill keep you all updated. Ill. Gonna bring it back to life!

[52 Bill]

As I said earlier, it will be a lot of work, but it is not impossible. Take your time and you will get it back to 100%.