Mellotronists

charel196 wrote:

> The story about the guy getting the tron from his neighbor made me
> wonder how many units have been lost in hurricanes(Charley?)
> tornadoes,fires,or floods that could account for all the missing
> manufactured product...(not counting Rick Wakeman's bonfire)

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Greetings All,

Good topic, Charles !  I often wondered myself.
There's a formula somewhere that predicts the
mortality rate for manufactured products in time.
Useful years, decline of parts/svc. avail, wear-and-tear,
and finally , placed on the curb or local heap.
And those Trons which fell victim to natural  hazards.
Mike Pinder himself reported that he lost a MK-V
in a brush fire at his Malibu ranch years ago.

>From personal experience, I maintained a $2-Million
piece of computer-chip equipment at IBM for 10 years.
One day, a second-level mgr. came-along and said
"Pull the plug, scrap-it."  Was working perfectly , easily
within its own specs, but someone/something decided
that it outlived itself.  I had the sad duty of dismantling
it and heaving the bits into two huge dumpsters.

Ever hear the auto-ad :  " Nine out of ten Subarus
mfg'd since 1985 are still on the road ?"
What they DON'T tell you that they include the
0.2% of extant 1985 rustbuckets along with the 89.5%
of year 2003 models in the equation.
......Marketing, hmmmm.

With the thousands of 1953 Corvettes made, how many
have survived to this day ? Prob. a small percentage.
55 Mark-I Trons were produced. Approx. 45 upgraded
to MK-II specs,leaving 10 in orig. state. We know of
three for sure. The other seven ?......The band "Jonesey"
used a MK-I  on LP's "No Alternative" and "Collage" .
Where's the Tron?  Even John Evan-Jones doesn't know.

Thru the years, I've seen precious Mellotron bits
and pieces wander-by. The frame of MK-II/163
(RIP) is in the UK.  Misc. parts of a disassembled
MK-V  (RIP) found in garage-sale in CT two years ago.
.....that sorta thing.  It would be nice to think that
there still are unfound "diamonds in the rough"
waiting to be rediscovered. But the mortality rate
of the older machines, plus lack of parts thru time
may have sealed their fate.

Let's keep this thread going,gang .

Cheers,  Jerry Korb (....no dumpster yet....)