Any Other Hammond Organ Players/Fans in Tulsa?

[Steve]

Glad for your response Scott and that you have had positive experiences with Rick and his KC shop.  I have recommended Rick and Tonewheel General to many people, and you are the first feedback I have heard that confirmed my advice as good!  

Many people say that the best Hammond B3 ever made was an A100!  Introduced in 1959, the A100 series has entirely the same guts as the B/C, just in a different furniture cabinet, and the A100 has built in reverb, power amp and speakers.  It was Hammonds very first "self contained" console model.  I have an A102, the "02" designating the french provincial furniture style.  I love my console reverb/speaker sound in conjunction with my Leslie 251.  Total nirvana for me, fills my home with the great Hammond tonewheel sound.  Hammonds are filled with electronic components that age differently, and you can have two identical instruments that were manufactured on the same day, and today sound totally different.  If you got a Hammond today that sounds great to your ears, leave well enough alone and don't tinker too much.  Replace tubes and components that are known to present safety issues with age, but other than that, they were built to last for 100 years or more.

I changed out all the tubes in my Hammond A102 and Leslie 251 about 2 years ago; I bought all NOS U.S. made tubes, such as Tung Sol, Westinghouse, RCA.  It wasn't cheap, cost me about $400 for all tubes, the most expensive being the NOS Tung Sol 6550's I bought for the Leslie.  I saved all known good original tubes for spares.  My Hammond A102 built in 1964 still had many original tubes with the red Hammond labels.  Hammond and Leslie amps don't put much stress on the tubes, and they will last for 40+ years or more unless you intentionally overdrive or distort regularly.

Glad to find another Hammond fan.  Where would rock & roll, gospel, blues music be today without the wonderfull sound of the tonewheel Hammond organ?  Current digital/computer simulations can come close, but for the player, nothing beats the sound, keyboard action, and overall playing enjoyment of a vintage Hammond organ.  I adore the waterfall keyboard design of my A102.  It makes you WANT to practice and be a better player, and I think that is a great hallmark of a quality musical instrument.

[bricon123]

Hi Steve and everyone else. I found this topic while searching for information on a Hammond 2100 I just saved. A co-worker of mine became the executor for his fathers estate (unfortunatly) and had the 1974 Concord 2100. When he told me he was going to take it to the dump with a lot of other stuff. Being a keyboard player, I freaked and grabbed it! Now I find two things about it: 1. Everyone in the world hates this model. 2. It doesn't work. Boy, I feel like a chump. Now it's sitting in my garage, still on the trailer and the wife is looking at me with the "so when is it going to go" look. That's the history so far.

Now, here is where I am at. The power light came on, the Leslie turns, and the casset works, just no sound. I figured that some fuse or the other was blown so I dug the power amp out (silver box, back left side under leslie unit) and sure enough I found 6 fuses and two 4 amp fuses were blown. I replaced them (pain, I am not very good at soldering) and turned on the organ. Heard the speakers start up for about 4 seconds then, oops, back to square one. When I checked the fuses, I found that only one was now blown. Progress!? Now I'm stumped, mainly because I dont really know what all of the electronic "doo-dads" on the circuit boards are. Being a curious sort and not knowing better, I have fixed other electronic stuff before using schematics and being just plain lucky.

With that said, Steve you mentioned in one of your post that the manual you had for your 2300 also noted the 2100? Does it have any schematics for the power amp? I'm pretty sure I can find the root cause if I could follow the trail on that one fuse and start looking for a dead short or a component that has "let the magic smoke out". If you could do me the favor and just give me a short reply either here or a quick email at Bricon123  @  Comcast.  net (plz ingnore the spaces, I put them in there to avoid email robots that scan message boards for email address's)

Hopefully this thread is still active and you all are still getting notices of replys. I would really appriciate your help if you have any ideas.
Thanks 
-Brian-

[Steve]

With that said, Steve you mentioned in one of your post that the manual you had for your 2300 also noted the 2100? Does it have any schematics for the power amp? I'm pretty sure I can find the root cause if I could follow the trail on that one fuse and start looking for a dead short or a component that has "let the magic smoke out". If you could do me the favor and just give me a short reply either here or a quick email at Bricon123  @  Comcast.  net (plz ingnore the spaces, I put them in there to avoid email robots that scan message boards for email address's) Hopefully this thread is still active and you all are still getting notices of replys. I would really appriciate your help if you have any ideas.
Thanks 
-Brian-

Hi!  Not everyone in the organ world hates the Hammond Concorde.  I for one love my 2307M Concorde, although I would never own a 2100 series except for parts.  Too many problems with that one.  Even the 2300 series are very maintenance heavy the older they get, but I love its rich, deep, vibrant theater organ sounds, especially when paired with the external Leslie 710 cabinet, which I have.

My factory service manual has all the schematics for both 2100 and 2300 series.  What is the serial # of your console?  After serial #376837, they made some changes and have additional data for those later 2100 organs.  Give me a few days, but I will try to do some scans and email to you.  I have schematics and layout for the 35 watt amp board, power supply board (the plugin circuit boards on the amp), and the entire power supply assembly for both 2100 and 2300 series.     Steve

[bobnad]

It's so great to stumble across this discussion.  I'm in Toronto Canada, and had a new 2100 series Concorde that got severely damaged over the years.  I picked up two more just like it this year, and one works almost perfect.  I keep the others for parts.  Have a problem on this one though, thought someone might have an idea.  The 8' drawbar on the lower manual registers full open for either drawbar preset whether full out or totally pushed in.  It doesn't really mess up any registrations seriously, but I would like to track down this problem and make it right.  I do have an original schematic book but I can't find any clues in it about this.
Appreciate any help with this.
Thanks
Bob

[Steve]

It's so great to stumble across this discussion.  I'm in Toronto Canada, and had a new 2100 series Concorde that got severely damaged over the years.  I picked up two more just like it this year, and one works almost perfect.  I keep the others for parts.  Have a problem on this one though, thought someone might have an idea.  The 8' drawbar on the lower manual registers full open for either drawbar preset whether full out or totally pushed in.  It doesn't really mess up any registrations seriously, but I would like to track down this problem and make it right.  I do have an original schematic book but I can't find any clues in it about this.
Appreciate any help with this.
Thanks
Bob

The first thing I would do would be raise the top panel and the metal panel containing the preset tabs directly above the drawbars.  This will completely expose the drawbar mechanisms for servicing.  Check that 8' drawbar for any loose connections or broken wires and clean the metal contact strip with Deoxit spray.  In fact, this would be a good time to just go ahead and clean all the drawbars.  The wires to the drawbars are not soldered but simply plug in to metal tabs on the back end of the drawbar.  Perhaps you have a broken wire or corroded connection that needs cleaning.

[bobnad]

Thanks much.  Didn't even give that area a thought....I'm always looking for something more complex.
Another problem that is recurrent is that the percussion colored tabs including piano solo (not the blue or white tabs) very often are active in a low volume even when not depressed and no keys are being played.  Piano solo makes it even louder.  It makes a messy sound like a handful of random keys are being played together.  Every time this happens I open 'er up, jiggle this and that, and all is OK, until the next session.  I HAVE cleaned every PWB connector in the entire organ.  I did however not yet do the tabs or drawbars.  I think I'll do them next and see what happens.

Another problem....just a lot of white noise when the organ is on and nothing is being played.  The 'hum' almost sounds like an old tube amp.  Can I do anything about that one?
Last, for now, is that I get a POP when switching the internal leslie from Slow to Fast and vice versa.
Thanks again very much.
Bob

[duncfair41]

Hi i have just been given Hammond Concorde 2300 series black and walnut case,i beleive you can take the sides of the organ off to aid getting through door any idea how i do this thanks Duncan, Cambridge, England.