Tue Jun 22, 2021 5:20 pm
I have just noticed this post asking about PedaMidikit.
I have both the 30-note pedalboard with two expression pedals, and also a set of three wood core Baroque style keyboards.
Allessandro Alfieri (I may have mis-spelled his name there, apologies) answers emails quite readily, and is a professional supplier. However, working at such a distance does cause some issues. Here is my account of my experiences.
1. I didn't find the transport to the UK from Italy a problem nor too expensive.
2. Mine parts were custom made to my specification, but there was an unusual pedal spacing between E-F and B-C which was not strictly RCO. (For those elsewhere than the UK, RCO was adopted in the USA in 1905, and there, it became the AGO standard). I didn't send any parts back to have that corrected, although I could have done. The pedalboard is driven by an Arduino Nano controller - a very very low cost option indeed for quite an expensive organ pedalboard!
One comment, in addition to the one about odd key spacing: The pedalboard leads are too short!
3. The keyboard stack looks good although it is not as well made, nor a visually perfect as the Laukhuff keyboards. However unlike the Laukhuff, they do have built in MIDI. This uses an Arduino Mega under the mocoLUFA USB-MIDI system - a very very low-cost system in a keyboard stack that will probably cost you thousands! The keys are a bit noisy, some more so than others. AND they are VERY difficult to adjust, as much dismantling has to be done. I would now pay more and get Laukhuff if I were starting again.
I have 37 illuminated thumb pistons on my keystack. However, a silly error in the software means that most of the LEDs do not have the same MIDI Note Number as their switches, which complicates their setting-up quite a bit. I could have returned the Mega to Italy for re-programming but that would have left me with no organ for a long time probably.
I asked for the source code so I could correct it myself (I have been a C Programmer since 1986 and have built a lot of functions into my console with Arduino controllers) but Alessandro said he couldn't let me have it for various reasons.
Sometime after I have upgraded my organ to HW6 I will re-wire the thumb pistons to hardware-correct the LED<>SWITCH mismatch as I cannot do it in software without the source code.
At the same time I will strip down the keyboards, adjust their keys speech points and silence those noisy keys! Then it will be perfect. Given the cost of the wood keyboards it is a pity that adjustment is so so difficult!
Maybe that helps.
Do a Google search for "KASpencerUK" - my YouTube channel, and go to the first Google item and you can find two video tours of the organ to which my commnets refer: my OPUS II organ.
If you visit my website at my-music.kaspencer.com you will also find details of my Core Component Kit for giving your organ console Automatic Electronic Stop Labelling. I will shortly be working on a kit of components for the control system and TFT displays which you will see in the videos, which that organ OPUS II also uses.
I hope that helps!
Kenneth Spencer
Last edited by
kaspencer on Tue Jun 22, 2021 5:28 pm, edited 1 time in total.