The Reuter Organ Company

Recently, my Materials and Processes class made a field trip down to The Reuter Organ Company (1220 Timberedge Road, Lawrence, KS 66049.)  Our tour guide was Tom Watgen who is the voicing supervisor at Reuter.  This company has been in Lawrence since 1919, and has been making, rebuilding, and restoring customized organs ever since.  These instruments can be extremely large, and are primarily found in churches.  However, churches aren’t the only ones who take advantage of these incredible instruments.  Universities, theaters, department stores, and private residence also utilize them.  Reuter Organ Company makes these instruments to last, and look good, but the importance of sound quality is what towers over everything.  We were introduced to several different materials that were used to manufacture these products.  The console is primarily made out of different types of wood.  This can include poplar, walnut, oak, MDF, etc.  The pipes of the organ can be made out of copper, zinc, tin, lead, brass, and steel.  They even combine tin and lead to create spotted metal.  Ivory is no longer used to produce the keys of the instrument.  Plastic, wood, and cow bone are great alternatives for this piece.  Another material we came across was leather.  Leather is used for the valve stoppers in the organ.  They use sheep, goat, lamb, and even kangaroo skin for this leather.  It was incredible how important it was that this piece was leather, and nothing else.  Leather is flexible and lasts a very long time.  There is no substitute for this material.  I was impressed with how much of the work manufacturing these instruments’ was done by hand.  Being a musician myself, I was especially impressed with the process of the organ pipes.  These pipes start in a sheet of metal, and are cut and hammered around the size and shape of the pipe they will soon become.   These pipes need to sound a certain way and hold a certain pitch, which makes this process very significant.  I was also impressed with the assembly and disassembly of these instruments.  Pipe organs can be gigantic and have many different parts. If an instrument needs repair, they need to be able to disassemble it and even ship it to fix it easily.  For our very first field trip, I found the Reuter Organ Company to be incredibly interesting, and the information to be very beneficial.  

Designing A Book: Final

Here are a few pictures of my final book.  I included one picture of each person's so you can see each person's style.

The end.

Well! That's it! The semester is over! I have made it through my freshman year of college! And what a good year it was!  

Over and out.

-Haley Crouch

Boat Rendering

For the final in my Drawing for Industrial Design class, we had to do a computer rendering over one of the three Playsam toys we drew this semester.  We had the choice of:

a car...

a boat....

or a plane.

I chose to do my rendering of the boat.  First we drew our object in perspective.  We then scanned it on the computer, and added shading and color with photoshop.  Here is my final project.

Designing a Book

For our last project in BDS 102, we had to design our very own book.  First, we chose a designer to research.  After collecting information, we wrote a brief biography about our designer.  I chose David Kelley, founder of IDEO.  We then created page spreads on InDesign to display our essay.
This is my final page spread.  Sorry for the layout of these pages! I don't know how to make them next to eachother.

Next we made a title page, press name and label, table of contents, and cover.  Since our book is smaller then the other groups in the class, we decided to play with that idea with the title and press name.

After making these individual pages, we collected the page spreads from our group members and put them all together to make a book.   I am currently waiting for the final book to be printed at Jayhawk Ink!

Stay tuned.

Constructing a Vessel: Summary

The entire Constructing a Vessel project was undeniably a learning experience.  However, I say that in the most positive way possible.  Although it may have been a little frustrating and hectic, in the end I acquired new knowledge and a few friends from the Common Shop.  Like every project I have worked on, I had a very hard time deciding what I wanted my vessel to look like.  So, I decided I should at least glue my wood together while I figured it out.  Once I determined my design, I started cutting it out on the band saw.  However, like my previous projects, I found myself wanting to proceed on a completely different design.  So, I started over by gluing new pieces of wood.  I was so excited about this design that I cut out the complete shape of my box (top view and side view), before cutting the lid and bottom.  Since the sides of my vessel were completely rounded, it was nearly impossible to cut my lid without the band pulling it in.  Therefore, I glued the bottom of my vessel to a flat piece of wood.  Although this set me back an hour, this plank of wood gave me a flat edge to make these needed cuts possible.  For this project, I was considering carving an intricate design in the floor of my box.  However, I discovered this was extremely hard, and decided to sand down my very forced and unsuccessful effort. Although the walls of my box glued back together just fine, I feel like the amount of cuts I made wasn’t necessary.  Another problem I ran into was fitting my lid on to my box.  I had sanded down the lid and walls of my box to the point where they didn’t exactly fit together as well.  The stopper for my lid was also unable to fit the curvature of the underside of the lid.  I had to figure out how to fit the lid to my box, and make it stay on.  So I went to the friendly workers of the Common Shop for some help.  We decided that rounding out the connecting edges of the lid and the walls of the vessel would help the lid fit on more comfortably.  We then added magnets on the inside of the walls and the lid so the lid would stay on.  I also learned that sanding is extremely important, even though it takes an extremely long time.  Working with wood is a very slow and tedious task.   Even though I ran into a few problems during this project, I am very excited and motivated to work with wood in the future.       

Constructing a Vessel: Process

For this project, I wanted to make a my wooden vessel something that could fit comfortably in someone's hand to imitate the objects it would be holding.

First, I cut the shape of my box, and separated the lid and flow of the box from it's body.

Then I drew, and cut out the inside of the box.

I rounded out the edges of the lid of my box and glued the sides back together.

Next, I glued the floor of the box and the body of the box back together.

I then started carving finger notches on the lid of my box.

After TONS of sanding, and a coating of Polyurethane I had my final product

Stayed tuned.

Constructing a Vessel: Description

In this project, Constructing a Vessel, we were to design and build a wooden vessel, using the band saw, that would hold something special and meaningful to us.  First we had to pick our object.  This object was supposed to be fairly small, since we would be working with sections of wood that were 8 x 5”.  To determine how we wanted our box to look, we started off by making mind maps.  This helped us connect key words to our object and figure out how they could help influence the structure and shape of our wooden vessel.  We used this information to draw sketches of possible designs.  Out of these sketches, we picked three to pursue, and constructed them out of materials such as cardboard, bristle board, or foam core.  This helped us not only determine the best size, shape, and structure to carry out in our final model, but also details such as how the lid would fit on, the thickness of the walls, what kind of wood we would use, etc.  We then refined one vessel idea for our final product.  Before we created a wooden model of our vessel, we viewed a demonstration in the Common Shop.  During this presentation, we learned about different types of wood, different tools we would come in contact with, and the safety guidelines behind it all.  We then practiced using the band saw with scrap wood to get us familiar with the machine.  When we became comfortable with the material, we bought our own wood to work with.  First, we glued the pieces of wood, holding them together with clamps to dry.  We then drew to scale what we wanted the top and side view of our vessel to look like.  I did this on a piece of paper and glued it on the wood with rubber cement to use as a guide when I cut out the shape on the band saw.  First, we cut out the side view of our vessel, along with the lid and the floor.  We used carpet tape to keep these three pieces together and cut out the top view of our vessel.  The middle section was then used to cut the walls of our box.  With much sanding and gluing, we finally covered our boxes with Polyurethane to give them a finished look.

            My wooden vessel holds a variety of stones.  However, it is based off of three specific stones that I carry with me everywhere; rose quartz, malachite, and hematite.  They were given to me by my mom and godmother to remind me everything was going to be all right whenever I was anxious, worried, or nervous.  I wanted my box to be something that could fit easily and comfortably in someone’s hand, since that is what these stones do and are used for.  Therefore, I made my wooden vessel a rounded, organic shape, like a stone, with indentations where a person’s fingers could rest.