> It is also reversible for the next guy who has to get the board out > of the piano or Maybe you. Can you imagine having to clean a rim joint > that was coated with tight bond, bulduc or some other kind of glue? What > a headache. Its obvious that modern wood glues have strength that cold > or hot hide doesn,t but it always amazes me how solidly our antiquated > pianos have hung ( and some not)together with animal colagen compound. > Imagine how much more difficult it would be to remove key bushings,guide > rail bushings, key buttons,hammershanks, soundboards,pinblocks etc for > repairs if the glue wasn't as reversible and workable as hide glue. Just > a thought in that direction. > Dale Erwin I wonder how necessary the consideration of reversibility is in soundboard work. For key bushings, guide rail bushings, etc, etc, I enthusiastically agree that (hot, not cold) hide glue is the way to go. But for soundboard work? I haven't removed hundreds of soundboards, so I may not have gotten a good cross sectional statistical sampling, but I've never been able to get one out without trashing it, even when the ribs were half separated from the panel. I've always had plenty of spruce chunks and glue to chisel and scrape off of the rim. Nor do I find soundboard replacement quite as casual and common a repair as replacing a set of hammers or key bushings. How many times have you put repeat sets of hammers or key bushings in the same piano? How many times for repeat soundboards? The need for reversibility is the requirement that the part you are NOT replacing be minimally damaged in disassembly. That would be the rim, and Titebond will scrape off of the rim with the application of heat just fine. The soundboard being replaced is trash or kindling anyway, preferably kindling, so the choice of glue used is irrelevant to that. As another mildly heretical observation, as long as I'm already in trouble. Though the old panel is severely compromised across the grain by cumulative compression set, it hasn't lost much if anything of it's long grain strength. Maybe we should be considering knocking the ribs off of these old boards, planing the finish off, and using them as stock to laminate up the rib sets for the new panels. After all, that old panel was the "soul of the instrument". Why not put it to good use in it's next incarnation? Ron N
This PTG archive page provided courtesy of Moy Piano Service, LLC