GB185227A - Improvements in and relating to musical instruments of the percussive type - Google Patents

Abstract

185,227. Davies, St. J. A. June 1, 1921. Drums, tambourines, cymbals, and triangles.- A bass drum is arranged horizontally and is struck on the lower drum-head by a depending striker impelled upwards by mechanism connected to a pedal. The bass drum may be combined with other pedal operated instruments, such as a side drum yielding simple, repeat, or grace-note effects, a cymbal, a triangle, and a tambourinedevice. Fig. 2 shows in plan the arrangement of the pedals 8 - - 17. The bass drum 1 is struck by the spring-controlled depending striker 34 impelled upwards by a vertically sliding rod 31, Fig. 3, carrying rollers 33, 29 at its ends and actuated by an extension 28 on a lever 20 pivoted at 21, the rear end of which lever is depressed by a swinging loop, which is in turn depressed by the pedal 8 provided with a heel-guide 9. The lever 20 normally rests on a cushioning-device 24. The swinging loop also actuates, by means of a lever which engages an arm on a rock-shaft, a striker which beats the inclined cymbal 66. This cymbal action may, however, be uncoupled by operating the pedal 14 in one direction, which moves the rock-shaft carrying the striker longitudinally so that its arm is not engaged by the lever. The cymbal may also be played solo from a pedal 13, which actuates a separate striker operating on the back of the cymbal. The vertically-arranged side-drum 117 is played with simple action from a pedal 10 rigidly connected to a spring-supported arm carrying a roller acting on another arm carried by the spring-controlled striker-shaft, so that, in striking, the striker is raised from an horizontal to a vertical position. The arms are arranged to give diminishing leverage and increasing velocity to the striker as the movement proceeds. The side-drum is played with a repeat action by depressing the pedal 11 simultaneously with the pedal 10, which causes a second, normally vertical, striker on a spring-urged rockshaft to be lowered into a horizontal position, this striker rising to strike the drum on release of the pedal. A grace-note effect is produced on the side-drum by depressing the pedals 10 and 12 simultaneously, the pedal 12 operating a third striker normally lying in an inclined, and therefore advanced, position relatively to the simpleaction striker. The arm operating the grace-note striker is in two spring-hinged parts to provide for lost motion. The triangle 179, supported within a guard 181, is struck by a spring-controlled lever operated from a pedal 15 in proximity to the bass-drum pedal 8. Tambourine effects are obtained from the simple-action and repeat-action strikers of the side-drum by depression of the pedal 16 mounted on an arm 187, Fig. 21, pivoted at 188, thus drawing down a spring-controlled rod 189 and bracket 190, so that a set of jingles 200 mounted thereon comes opposite fixed jingles 203. Un depressing the pedals 10, 11, lugs on the corresponding strikers strike the mounting of the jingles 200, the strikers themselves being provented from striking the drum by the interposition of a felt. screen 212 carried by the bracket 190. The grace-note striker may also be screened by felt 214. The tambourine effect is out out by the pedal 17, which releases a catch 201 holding the arm 187 depressed.