Piano Stage Truck - Integral?

[Ron Nossaman]

>Hello all ye esteemed knowledgeable piano tech folks.

What the heck. It's an open list. I'll respond anyway.


>Seems to me this kind of thing could easily be made strong enough to 
>substitute for a clunky metal stage truck. Opinions?

Sure it could, especially if it were laminated,,, with EPOXY! Ok, I'm kind 
of slow. Now I'm starting to see the reasoning here.


>What would a set of 3-3/8" wide by 3-1/2" tall brass casters do to an oak 
>stage floor?

Make crunchy noises and iron any passing dust, grit, or pencils into the 
floor. And they cost more than Plutonium. And how are you going to mount 
them both unobtrusively and with some structural integrity and keep the 
piano the proper height? Seems to me you have three choices. Whack the.legs 
off shorter (or make new legs) and install the casters in the leg ends. 
Cantilever the casters up and out. Recess the casters up and in toward the 
center.

Option one will leave the casters visible, endorphinally justifying those 
big shiny solid gold gleamers. It will be the least aesthetically 
objectionable (if it doesn't look like a Lego car), allowing minimal bulk 
bracing between the legs, and giving the impression that the piano is 
actually sitting on something. It will also be the easiest to engineer and 
build.

Option two has some added engineering challenges and, since the solid gold 
casters are socketed, some aesthetic drawbacks as you enclose the socket 
projection and try to make the piano look like it's not wearing Granny 
Clampit's boots.

Option three makes the enclosing of the socket less ridiculous looking, but 
only when you skirt the thing down far enough to hide the casters 
altogether - in which case you should probably just put it on a standard 
affordable stage truck with non-destructive, non-glowinthedark wheels and 
be done with it.

Maybe you could outline the standard stage truck in long fringe and sweep 
the stage every time it's moved. I kind of like that.


>Thanks for any and all input.

Remember you said that.

Ron N