Baldwin floating plates

[Michael J. Wathen]

Fred Strum wrote:

>I believe the notion at Baldwin was to make a bridge that was laminated
>without a cap, for even better sound transfer. This would also be more
>efficient to manufacture - less waste of wood, all you need is this strip
>lumber, glue, and a caul. But there was a problem making notches. They needed
>to be machined with a router like tool. (A chisel just chews out splinters in
>this set up).

I spoke with Mr.Conklin about this very thing several months ago.  I told
him that I thought that the vertically laminated bridge resists the
gradually deformation of surface that normally occurs on the surface.  I
then asked him about the history behind the change.  I was rather surprised
that it had nothing at all to do with the quality of the sound.  The only
reason for changing was that it was getting harder and harder to come up
with large quantities of bridge stock for capping.  Keep in mind that makers
for the most part use quarter sawn hard rock maple. If you think about the
process you will realize that you have to go through quite a lot of logs,
cutting and re sawing just to get the boards you need for a cap.  If you
can't get what you need that way then you have to do a whole bunch more of
re sawing, planing and gluing in order to get what you want.  So the
cappless bridge makes a lot of sense from that prospective.

90% of what Harold Conklin lorded over was improving manufacturering
techniques although I think I am safe in saying that he likes the other
stuff better (improving the performance of the piano).  

Also,  I have heard that Kawai is switching to these capless bridges.  It
makes so much sense.  I only wish there was a way to recap with the same
idea.  Mating two extremely hard wood surfaces for gluing is very difficult.
On almost every piano I do there is some spot I am not satisfied with which
requires me to route out portion of the newly glued cap and try again.
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 Michael J. Wathen			Phone:	513-556-9565
 Piano Technician			Fax:	513-556-3399
 College-Consevatory of Music		Email:  Michael.Wathen@UC.Edu	
 University of Cincinnati
 Cincinnati, OH 45221-0096
 
http://www.uc.edu/~wathenmj/