Key Bushing Mortises

[Murray Seminuk]

Hi Terry
Terry I have a jig to router mortises much like the way Yamaha keys are
done.Straight across the whole keybottom.You only have to remove enough wood
to accomodate the compressed cloth .Make sure the mortise is centred  and
the same width as the cauls that you are using.In doing this the cloth will
not have an effect on the touch of the instrument.

Murray
----- Original Message -----
From: "Farrell" <mfarrel2@tampabay.rr.com>
To: <pianotech@ptg.org>
Sent: Friday, January 11, 2002 10:55 AM
Subject: Key Bushing Mortises


> I am rebushing keys from an older spinet. The mortises on the front rail
do
> not have regular little recessed areas on each side of the mortise for the
> little flap of bushing cloth that is typically left over the edge (on a
> plane with the bottom of the key). All other keys I have rebushed or have
> had rebushed had a nice little recessed area next to the mortise to
> accommodate the left over flap. The old bushings from these keys had the
> little flap, but the flaps were irregular in that some were partly
submerged
> in a crude recess, some were not submerged and stuck out below the bottom
of
> the key, etc., i.e. a real mess. My experience with this arrangement is
that
> it is difficult to get nice consistent dip with an irregular bottom to the
> key.
>
> So, what to do. If this were my piano for life, I would rout out or chisel
> out the proper recess. This is not my piano, but I do want to have flat
key
> bottoms. Can I cut the bushings at the key bottom and not have any flap -
> much like many center rail bushings are cut? That would certainly be the
> easiest solution, assuming I would get proper performance (I don't see why
> this would not work - or is it too easy to damage the bushing when setting
> the key onto the pin?). If that is not a good idea, can someone suggest
the
> easiest method of making the little recess - I prefer not to make a career
> out of this set of keys, but I do want to do a decent job. Thanks for any
> ideas.
>
> Terry Farrell
>
>
>