On Sat, 17 Feb 1996, Bill Stratton wrote: > A first timer; a lurker for awhile now. > > Recently I tuned an old Kranich & Bach upright (serial #32169). It was > interesting to me in that it had red hammers. Having never seen such, > it caught my attention. I am wondering if anyone can shed any light on > this as to how many makers put red hammers in their pianos and why. The > felt was clearly red before the hammer was made. I once filed a set of Cable upright hammers with blue reinforcement, and even with a dust mask on,an hour later when I blew my nose - BLUE SNOT!!! It scared the heck out of me for a moment. > Secondly, after several years of using an acetone and plastic key > mixture to harden hammers, I've decided to try acetone and sanding > sealer. This is Wally Brook's method for hammer hardening and I love it. Making sure that the bass of the hammer is very hard+resillient, as well as the area under the strike point, and the tone and volume of the hammers jumps! You will probably need to strengthen the shoulders a little too. Making sure that all loose felt is removed regularly, keeps the tone from getting fuzzy, and then for a little sparkle, a drop of acetone+keytop on the strike point is all that's necessary. The S&S hammers that I have seen lately respond very well to this treatment, at least on the stage pianos that I work with. Al Zajicek
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