two questions answered

[Richard Brekne]

Hi list.. and especially Newton

Wanted to get back to all interested on the post to let ya'll know what
it ended up with. You may recall I had a couple questions relating to
two different pianos.

1. The "P" piano <grin> with the problem of missing unless the jacks
were regulated well behind the knuckle core.

As it turns out on this the set of hammers that were installed a couple
years ago by another tech in town were all of 3 mm to short (bore
length). To "compensate" this fellow had installed 3 mm of shims under
the hammer rail. I really don't quite understand what he was after
there, but it explained the problem I had getting the action in and out
of the piano (drop screws scraping on the bottom of the pinblock). In
any case a new set of hammers appropriate for the piano are on order,
and I have a nice job ahead of me re-establishing a reasonably good
geometry for the action. So that question is answered.


2. The Yamaha grand that had the dancing hammers in spite of a well
bedded key frame.

The bedding was just fine. All action screws were tight, found out that
if I slightly wedged the top of the hammer rail against the underside of
the pinblock the hammers didnt bounce when playing hard. I was convinced
that there was a spring in the rail in the end, in spite of all the good
advice I received on the list with regards to bedding, action mount
problems etc. So I took off the hammer rail (thinking what the hell,
I'll try anything) and was going to reinstall it and found the problem.
The left tenor action bracket no longer lined up with the hole for the
hammer rail at this point. It was in fact 2mm off and one had to start
all screws for the rail and force the issue to getting them tight. This
of course caused the spring in the rail. I plugged the hole in the rail,
rebored and re-mounted the hammer rail and the problem was solved. This
is a t year old Yamaha, and I dont think anyone has had a chance to dink
around with it yet (but who knows). If this was a factory blunder...
well its not one typical of Yamaha.

In any case both questions are answered. Thanks again to all for the
advice and good posts. Thanks again for Newton for taking the time to
write out proceedures for action bedding. I hope many readers were smart
enough to keep that one on their hard disks.

Richard Brekne
I.C.P.T.G.  N.P.T.F.
Bergen, Norway