S&S green goop

[Jim Coleman, Sr.]

Hi Ken:

Many years ago Vic Jackson of L.A. taught many of us to take of the action
stack, go down the line flipping out each repetition spring to one side,
then using a carpenter's pencil and cloth clean out the green goop. 
This is done most easily with the action upside down on the work bench.
Then, with the same pencil lubricate the slot. The rep springs will be much
more consistent but will seem stiffer, so regulation is definitely in order.

PS Vic also lubricated the groove with VJ lube which he invented.

Jim Coleman, Sr.

On Thu, 17 Jun 1999, Ken Jankura wrote:

> List,
> Have any of you noticed the correlation between difficulty of rep spring
> regulation and amount of green goop in the rep spring lever slot on
> Steinway actions? I've been regulating an L, using a technique taught by
> the great John Hartman, whereby you use a small 1 gram (or so) weight which
> you clip to the strike point of the hammer. When you set each hammer to
> 'just barely rise' from check, you get consistent spring tension, and a
> very even 'speed of rise' difference from bass to treble. It has worked
> well for me the few other times I have tried it, but on this one, despite
> my best efforts, they end up working a little inconsistently. Is it the
> green goop? This piano seems to have quite a bit of it. I know that it is a
> special secret formula mixture of moose earwax and equatorial pond algae
> designed especially to aid in repetition, but I was also wondering whether
> anyone makes it a routine part of regulation to clean this out, and replace
> it with graphite, Protek MPL, VJ lube, Chapstick, etc. I know it would only
> help to replace it, but exactly how does one do this quickly and
> efficiently? It's not in this piano's budget to disassemble to clean, or is
> there an easier way?
>  
> Ken Jankura
> Newburg,PA
>  
>  
>