Depowering a Piano

Farrell mfarrel2@tampabay.rr.com
Tue, 30 Dec 2003 16:39:30 -0500


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Yamaha C3, piano bar in nightclub. Serviced every two weeks. Always been =
a good piano in very good condition. New piano player for last two or =
three months. The guy is a major pounder. Lots of broken bass strings =
(maybe 10 in the last two months - never before). The key bushings have =
also gone from excellent condition to slapping neighboring keys.

The guy I work for requested that I depower the piano by decreasing blow =
distance and, correspondingly, key dip. Seems like a good idea. I had =
not heard of that approach before. Seems to me the piano player will =
notice it and not like it. But that is just my guess. I reduced dip in =
the bass by 0.075" - and then blow by about five times that - to about =
1.5 inches. (From middle "C" on down, I added 0.025" punchings on the =
front rail every half-octave until I got to the bass where I added the =
three punchings to each front key pin - so that there was a transition =
to the shorter dip.)

I have seen recommendations for increasing let-off to depower a pounder. =
I have never tried that though. Just curious whether anyone has any =
experience with the technique I outlined above, and how much dip/blow =
reduction is best to adequately depower the piano, but not aggravate the =
player too much. The amount I used what just a wild guess on my part.

Terry Farrell
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