PLIER VOICING - SURVEY

[w sikora]

Bill,

I agree with you.  For improving the overall sound of the piano,  Vice-Grips
deliver more bang for the buck than any tool except the tuning lever.

I use the method taught by Wally Brooks for voicing his new hammers.  He
sets the large Vice-Grips at 1/4" and squeezes the lower shoulders of each
hammer starting at A0 and going about 2/3 of the way up the scale. Yes, this
leaves a mark on the hammers.   I like to wrap some electrical tape on the
adjusting screw to keep the setting at 1/4".  I always do some deep needling
at about 10 O'Clock and usually the "sugar coating" treatment.  

I consider the Vice Grip treatment _a must_ if the hammers are old and have
to be re-shaped.  It has never failed to restore glorious tone.  It really
evens out the problem area at the break.  I charge my highest rate for this
work.

This voicing technique is of a higher priority than regulating in terms of
overall improvment of the piano.  I think it should be taught as one of the
fundamental skills, not as one of the finer points to be left for later.  I
sure wish I'd learned it sooner rather than later!

Walter Sikora, RPT
Chapel HIll, NC

At 11:01 PM 11/27/97 +0000, you wrote:
>I have been reading all the posts about wetting hammers, steaming hammers,
> stabbbing them with needles, washing plastics and lacquers in and out of
>them, ironing them, etc. I am beginning to feel pity for the poor little
>things.
>
>Let's have it!   Who out there has had good or bad experiences with plier
>voicing!  Are there any strong prejudices about the way one massages wool
>fibers in hard hammers?
>
>IMHO - Two minutes of plier voicing,  which uses gas burner pliers or small
>Vice Grip pliers to squeeze the shoulder areas of hammers that is normally
>needled in voicing, can make a huge improvement in tone, especially to Jesse
>French spinets, Winter spinets,  and 1910 big old uprights with rock hard
>hammers. I use the technique on perhaps 4 or 5 pianos a year and never charge
>for it because an entire set of hammers can be treated in less than three
>minutes.  I am not suggesting that one go regulate a Steinway concert grand
>this way, -- but WHY NOT? - It is/was a technique very heavily used decades
>ago but has become unfashionable now.  I would love to hear technical reasons
>for its demise!
>
>I KNOW that one is supposed to sell a new set of imported hammers and a
>$200.00 voicing job on these PSO's, but that is unrealistic.  By the way,
> the plier voicing holds for about 6 months to a year.
>
>(Putting on my flame retarding suit)
>Bill Simon
>Phoenix
>