I have several questions regarding rebuilding upright damper levers. I need to replace all damper lever springs and felt. Anyone willing to help? 1) Damper spring flange cord. What is the best way to remove it? I tried pushing it through - just jammed up in the spring area and......(flange is now in vice with tite-bond). Is there a handy way to pull it through? Or should it be cut with a razor at the spring and then pushed? I did take the steel center pin out first (I assume that is the way to start at least). 2) The cord in the one flange I have removed appears to not have been glued in place - is this OK to reproduce when installing the new cord? 3) Should the new cord simply be pulled through and cut to length? If it is not glued in, is it not going to crunch up inside when I try to install center pin? Is there some procedural trick to getting new cord and pin in? Or should I glue it in regardless of whether it was originally glued in or not? 4) There is a creased little round piece of felt/cloth at the lever top where the top of the spring rubs against the lever. Some levers do not have cloth, instead they have a direct wire-to-graphited wood contact. Do I need the felt/cloth? Can I just remove it and put some dag on the groove in lever? If it is best to replace felt/cloth, what should it be replaced with? I do not find any such identified thing in the catalogs. 5) What kind of felt/cloth is used at the bottom of the lever where the damper lift rod and damper spoons push against the damper lever? 6) What kind of bushing felt/cloth should be used in the damper lift rod bushing holder thingees? Is there any source for older style bushing holder thingees? I know they have the newer ones in the catalogs, but I will have to chisel/rout a new spot for these if I need to convert. My original ones have a round base and appear to be made of copper or brass. I know cloth is woven. How does felt differ? How to tell the difference when examining old cloth/felt? An aside - but related topic: I am engaged in doing a partial rebuild of an upright action. The lady is pretty sure that she will go ahead with rebuilding the entire piano in the next few years - but not now (turn-of-century Fisher upright - her grandmother's piano - and she learned to play on it). The action was too bad to play, so I told her we could start with the action. Planned on replacing hammers, shanks, butts, and damper felt. I guessed good and have found the wippens to be in amazingly good shape - if we want to replace them later, we can - but they will function well for now. The dampers however has a few broken springs, moth-eaten felt, little round felt detaching, etc. I will rebuild these things and not charge her, because I should have been able to identify the troubles and include the damper rebuilding as work required. I suppose I could just put the other parts on and not rebuild the dampers - but then, well, you know how much luck I will have when I try to regulate the whole shebang and how it will work (or not). I guess what I am getting at is that is never ceases to amaze me how interrelated piano parts are. It is extremely difficult to take an old action and make it work right without replacing most all parts. You certainly cannot expect to ignore one whole system just to save money. This is what I did in this case - ignored the damper levers. When I actually got all the old butts & wippens off and only the dampers remained, I started looking at them and wondering why several seemed weaker than the others - broken springs. Then I noticed the little groove felts that were loose. I took a few off and realized the lift felt was bug/moth eaten. I have no idea how so many of these "tooner-techs" can put cheap new hammers, bass strings, and damper felts on an old worn-out piano and call it "rebuilt" - and sleep at night.
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