An interesting spinet

[Piannaman@aol.com]

---------------------- multipart/alternative attachment
List, 

I know that subject line seems like a bit of an oxymoron, but it's true.  I 
worked on a spinet the other day that was at least an attempt to make a good 
piano.  

It was a 1947 George Steck.  The first interesting thing I noticed when I 
took off the music desk was that the lifter wires did not slide into slots on 
the ends of the keys.  Instead, there were holes drilled through the key-ends 
that the wires poked through.  Lost motion regulation was accomplished by 
turning a round wood nut that was held in place by a cork nut like you find 
on many player parts.  My first thought was "how do you get these out of here 
without a major hassle and crumbling pieces??"  

I opened the bottom to adjust the pedal mechanism, and I found my answer:  
there is a rail with flanges screwed to it iunder the keybed that has lifters 
to which the lifter wires are attached.  The whippens rest on a felt platform 
at the opposite end of each lifter.  So one has to detach nothing to get the 
action out, except the four bracket bolts.  

Definitely a better mousetrap, but I'm sure in the end it proved far too 
costly to fabricate.  Anybody else ever seen one of these?  I was also 
surpised by the lack of false beats in the high treble(though, as usual, the 
bass was torture).

Dave Stahl



---------------------- multipart/alternative attachment
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: https://www.moypiano.com/ptg/pianotech.php/attachments/c3/83/73/af/attachment.htm

---------------------- multipart/alternative attachment--