Steinway D questions

[Stéphane Collin]

Hi Kurt.

On the Brussels seminar, André tought us the very best way to regulate those 
butterfly springs.
With the dedicated tool, if the spring is too tight, just push from above 
the upper part of the spring way down.  If too weak, then, catch the little 
hook on the upper part of the spring, give the tool a little clockwise turn 
and pull it a little to you.  The idea is to never give a kink to any of the 
two branches of the spring, but to work on the coil rather.
When adapting this method to my real life, I found most efficient to roughly 
weaken the spring just too much, and then to get it back precisely where I 
want it by the pulling and turning movement.  Works great.  Just forget the 
finger bend and massage method.

Best regards

Stéphane Collin






----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Kurt" <KurtGearheart@comcast.net>
To: <pianotech@ptg.org>
Sent: Friday, November 12, 2004 5:34 PM
Subject: Steinway D questions


> Hi List,
>
> Just (nearly) finished regulating a Steinway D 9', used ONLY for concert 
> work in a hall.
>
> Two problems/questions.
>
> 1. What is the most efficient way to adjust these #$%^%$#^@^ repetition 
> springs? Is there a special tool, (other than the custom made piano wire 
> hook tool I've made), or technique, to accurately and simply adjust these 
> ^%#^$#^ things? The springs are uniformly far too strong and need to be 
> weakened a LOT. Rep springs are definitely my least favorite part of 
> regulating. I can do this with my custom tool, but hope there is a faster 
> more precise approach.
>
> 2. Voicing specific "deadish" notes. These are Steinway hammers. They 
> appear to have been soaked with hardeners, and have very little soft felt 
> left on top after a minimal shaping I had to do. In addition, a previous 
> tech overhardened them, then yet ANOTHER tech needled them down to 
> compensate for the first tech. There are about six notes from the upper 
> tenor to low high treble that have nearly no sustain but a harsh attack, 
> insufficient loudness, and seem to have an extremely annoying tonal "hole" 
> between the fundamental and the highest partials. In other words, one 
> hears the fundamental which dies quickly, then very high metallic 
> harmonics, but no to little octave/octave fifth harmonics. Hammers are 
> fine aligned to strings, let-off is slightly less than 1/16th, notes are 
> regulated exactly like their neighbors, strings are seated on bridges, 
> strings have been leveled, and hammers are correctly fitted to strings. 
> Picking the strings seem to indicate poor response in the strings rather 
> than a hammer problem, but the repeated work by other techs before me make 
> me wonder. Slightly moving hammer alignment does nothing. Moving tonally 
> good adjacent hammers to problem note does very little as well. Could 
> these be "dead spots" relative to soundboard/bridge responsiveness? Could 
> the hammers themselves have been "killed"? Suggestions how to get mid 
> harmonics back in and longer sustain and louder volume greatly 
> appreciated.
>
> Thanks in advance.
>
> PS to Joe Garrett: I AM using the company you suggested for the square 
> grand hammers.
> ;-)
>
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