Wed 23rd Feb 13:00 – 14:00
The seminar will take place in Newton building room 233, and will also be streamed via Teams. Afterwards, there will be an opportunity to experience the experiment in our small reverberation chamber (subject to demand).
Right: Figure from the 1898 Proceedings of the American Institute of Architects, showing the experimental setup.
Abstract
In 1898 Sabine’s first method was published in the Proceedings of the American Institute of Architects:
“An organ pipe, of the Gemshorn stop, an octave above middle c with a frequency of 512 Hz, was used as the source of sound in some preliminary experiments, and has been retained in subsequent work in the absence of any good reason for changing. The wind supply from a double tank, water-sealed and noiseless, was turned on and off by an electro-pneumatic valve, designed by George Sherburn Hutchings, similar to that used in his large church organs. The electric current controlling the valve also controlled the chronograph, and was made and broken by a key in the hands of the observer from any part of the room.”
Biography
Dr Alan Taylor first graduated from the University of Salford in 1969 with a degree in civil engineering. In 1979, following a period of employment on various major road and bridge projects in the North West of England, he built the first software controlled pipe organ switching system in the world and formed A J & L Taylor Ltd to market the product. The system used 256 bytes of memory and is still functioning today. The company continued to develop other pipe organ related products up until his retirement in 2006. Following this, he returned to Salford as a mature student and completed his PhD with the Acoustics Research Group, graduating in 2019.