brass rail hardware

[Dave Nereson]

    When encountering broken butt plates on brass rail upright actions, I've
always been able to keep the same screw and just replace the butt plate.
Until a few years ago, or until the demise of APSCO.  The screws and butt
plates supplied by APSCO were 3-56 (#3 screws, 56 threads per inch), which
is what was in most old uprights.  But the ones ya get from Schaff now are
3-48.  So you not only have to put in a new butt plate, but change the
screw, too, since the old one won't fit the new plate.  This involves
finding a screw-holder or screw-holding screwdriver that will fit between
damper levers (haven't found one yet), or using tweezers to insert the new
screw, a step that was unnecessary when they used to supply screws the same
as what was in the piano.
    Not only that, but the screws are too @#*$% long!!  When inserted and
tightened, they run right into the hammer butt, preventing the screw from
being tightened all the way and preventing the butt from moving!!  Didn't
they try them out first before they started selling them?  Typical Schaff
(shaft), in my opinion.  So you have to first cut the screw shorter, then
file it square so it will thread into the butt plate, then remove a damper
lever or use long tweezers to get the new screw in.
    The original screws are conical on the underside of the head, to fit the
countersunk hole in the brass rail.  But Schaff just gives you plain old
round-head screws that don't quite get the same torque in drawing the butt
plate up to the center pin, because they don't seat correctly in the hole.
Plus the plates themselves have a bevel on one face for some unknown reason,
and the edges aren't quite parallel, so they don't quite fit the butt-plate
holder that Schaff sells, either!
    Like breakfast cereal companies, with their impossible-to-tear-open
inner bags, they don't care if you can use the product, or whether it works,
just as long as you buy it.
    So, along with the old slotted, good quality steel wood screws, save
some of that old brass rail hardware, damper head screws, brass damper
lifter rod hangers, fallboard locks, etc.  They won't keep making them
forever.
     --David Nereson, RPT