Foam Rubber on Rest Rail?

[Ron Nossaman]

>I was sitting on the floor(the tables were too small to fit an action) of 
>a Chinese restaurant filling the hammers of an MX 80 Yamaha 42" console 
>when I noticed something I had never seen or noticed before:  the hammer 
>rest rail "felt" was actually foam rubber.  Well, the shanks do land 
>softly...:-) It made me wonder about the quality of materials in the rest 
>of the piano.
>
>Didn't have time to do a full inspection as I was hustling to get the 
>piano back together in a fairly dark environment before the restaurant 
>opened(made it with 5 minutes to spare).  Like most Yamahas that I've 
>tuned, it had very few strings with false beats and the pins were 
>consistent.  But how long before it starts to self-destruct?  Especially 
>since it is a Disklavier and gets played at least 8 hours a day...
>
>Dave Stahl


On Disklaviers verticals with the hammer sensors, the shanks can bounce 
high enough off a felt rest rail on return to record another keystroke when 
none was intended. I think the foam is just to limit the bounce, not to 
save a nickle on cost over real cloth. Remember the ones with the little 
pneumatic braking cylinders mounted on the rail?

Ron N