How wide in diameter is a 32 foot organ pipe?

Answer 1

It varies depending on the type or stop and it's scale. The largest metal Diapason in the Atlantic City Convention Hall Organ measuring 24 inches. The Wanamaker Organ has a wooden Diapason measuring 32 inches by 27 inches with 3 inch walls. Less heroic organs, of course, will have diapasons of this pitch of a smaller scale, between 16 and 18 inches. Typically, a bourdon measures about the same as a wooden diapason but is of course approx. half the length. Strings are usually between 8 and 10 inches. Reeds are another matter entirely. A contra fagotto will measure between 8 and 12 inches at the bell depending on the design where a bombard or Trombone may be as large as a diapason at the bell. The lower end of reeds varies greatly depending on whether the socket is of wood or metal and has starter pneumatics which of course take up a bit of room. A 4 to 5 inch boot is usual for metal sockets (without starter pneumatics of course). Boots with starter pneumatics are usually rectangular and are usually around 8 inches wide. Diaphones, valvular reeds, can be quite enormous at their business end. Hope - Jones' first diaphone, in the Ocean Grove organ, was reportedly 4 feet wide at the top with 4 inch thick walls. It was replaced (decades later) by a more modest 3 foot scale diaphone after the original failed, no one bothered to repair it and it was removed (it still manages to cause branches of the trees in the park outside to rattle). The 32 foot principal pipes one sees in the facades of baroque European organs are of modest scale, usually no more than 16 inches, due to the fact that large pipes use vast quantities of wind and before mechanical blowing, wind was a precious commodity not to mention the fact that their great weight sometimes caused them to collapse at the foot.