Hammermaker's corner 5

[isaacah]

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Hammermaker's corner5.



Ari Isaac.





I haven't been blind always, I was born with Glaucoma. I had many =
surgeries as a child and they did not feel nice, when they poke needles =
into your eyes. well, eye surgery in the 1940s was just beginning its =
long, uphill saunter out of the dark ages. Many were consigned back to =
the dark ages for life by eye specialists with big names who, I'm sure, =
did their best.=20

When I had my penultimate operation, fixing a retinal detachment from =
which, I well knew, I would emerge pretty blind, I sank into a deep =
depression. I was, at one point, ready to give up completely. At some =
point in the midst of that deep morass something inside me said "no!". I =
am going to live a normal life, I'm not going to let blindness have the =
upper hand, or stop me from doing whatever I may want to do!.=20

It took five long, difficult years to come to terms with being blind; =
walking into things time and again, reaching to pick up some object only =
to reach too far or too short and breaking, or dropping the thing, going =
into a room full of people and looking to find someone, going into a =
restaurant and trying to find a seat... all of which meant having to =
acknowledge my blindness to myself and telling myself, no, convincing =
myself that, inspite of it all I am like everyone else because while my =
handicap, condition, whatever one may call it, was immediately apparent =
to all - everyone else had their own handicaps which, while not =
immediately obvious, were, possibly as limiting (or more so) than mine. =
Maybe their limitation was only a severe shiness or some fear preventing =
them from reaching their potential - they were still burdened with some =
limitation.

It was a tuning customer, a wonderful lady I met for two hours, never =
again, who made me aware of the fact that people are not interested in =
others' problems. Look at someone who is the 'life of the party', =
someone who others are attracted to. Does that person not have any =
problems? Of course they do but they don't dwell on those problems. What =
they project is something others are attracted to; positive stuff, =
leaving their problems aside.=20

I mention all of this to point out one difficulty I had to deal with - =
not being able to see along with the stubborn persistance I pushed ahead =
with to get my project completed.=20

One of the great blessings in my life has been the people who, of all =
the ones I've met, stick around and become my friends or become close. =
These are all remarkable people and it has been my privilege to know and =
to appreciate them, probably not enough.

I now called on my friend S who introduced me to someone who owned and =
ran a welding shop, one that undertook big, complex projects. Dave, the =
amiable, bungling English machinist was, I'm afraid, left far behind. My =
x and I delved into hammer press literature and decided to modify Alfred =
Dolge's most advance press. I had come to the conclusion that if =
resilience is to play an important role in the function of producing =
tone, it had to be safeguarded throughout the entire process of making =
the hammer. All of the presses I'd seen, not just at Ronson, completely =
ignored resilience during the process of attaching the felt to the =
moldings. The press I was going to build was not going to.=20

The first part to design was the cawl, the former that formed the radius =
from the strike point of the hammer to the shoulder. Every time I =
started to design some part I was forced, by the process of designing, =
to think further about the precise function of the part being designed. =
How the cawl was to be made depended on how the hammers were going to =
function in the piano. It is my conviction that musical tone (I shall =
attempt to define later) can be produced only by a hammer functioning =
like a combination compression/expansion spring. The compression spring =
is the part from strike point to shoulder, the expansion - from shoulder =
to secondary fastener, pin, staple etc. The relationship between the =
amount of felt pushed down at every point from bass to treble and the =
space inside the cawl was critical as was the length of the cawl and the =
material from which to have it made. One of the biggest, most difficult =
tests of my life was just around the corner.=20


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