Motorized Barberpole Phaser (was Re: Another kind of Phasing)

[media at mail1.nai.net]

>Any and all advice on this idea is greatly appreciated.  I am also
>interested in any and all electro-mechanical sound modifiers that have ever
>been used (the Hammond vibrato, the weird Morley/Fender electrostatic oil
>drum echoes, Leslies, and so on).

Such devices have a distinct aesthetic appeal -- like little boys watching
a construction site we are charmed by the moving of mechanical parts.  Some
people still keep plate reverbs which are as about as practical as having a
bulldozer in the studio :)

I have one of those Morley Rotating Wah's.  Nothing else I've heard sounds
like it.  It has this dark eerie warbling that reminds me think of a swamp.
I have heard about the "electrostatic oil," but I would love a more
detailed description of how it works.

>Check http://www.patents.ibm.com/, and look for patents by Harald Bode (not
>HarOld, as I thought, but HarAld).  He has one which may just be the
>infamous Barberpole phaser.  The number is 4399326.  I'd download it, but I
>have to head out to see "Stomp" with my girlfriend.  Let me know if the
>patent seems useful.

I have in front of me U.S. Patent 3,800,088, March 26, 1974, "Apparatus For
Producing Special Audio Effects Utilizing Phase Shift Techniques" by Harald
E. W. Bode, which at one point says, "The outputs of the multipliers [25
and 26] feed into a summing network with the potentiometer [28] for
combining and balancing the output signals of said two multipliers, thus
generating a resultant signal, which represents the input audio signal
shifted by the amount of beat frequency."

I'm not up to speed with the rest of you guys on this, but from what I can
tell the document seems relevant.

PEACE OUT :)
MARK




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