"zero friction" bearings

[David Skolnik]

Stephen -
I'm still sifting my way through your reply to my comments on CAUT, 
however, if you think it would be helpful, I could re-post that to this 
list as well. Of course, if you think I shouldn't, you'll have to find some 
rather tactful way to say so, as I am extremely sensitive, or maybe I'm not.

In the meantime, I have yet another set of questions in a related area - 
tuning pins and such.  Ignoring, for the moment, both the screw-stringer 
model AND the Conklin arrangement, which you indicated considering for 
your  piano (U.S. Patent # 4,920,847), is it of any interest to you, and, 
if so, have you the means, to examine and measure the individual aspects of 
the traditional tension regulating system, the tuning pin in a wrest plank? 
(For that matter, has such research already been done, either by a 
manufacturer or in academia?)

While I might be missing something yet, my test list would entail 
controlled boring of holes in a wide variety of blocks, control of pin 
diameter, type of finish and thread, information on pin's 
metallurgy,  testing of torsion and flex characteristics (including any 
deformation recovery time),  the relationship between pin flex / torque and 
pin/block conditions, such as height of coil above block surface (with and 
without plate bushing), effect of differences in torque at surface of 
pinblock vs. interior, effect of increased density material at surface of 
block,  etc.

The connection to the topic at hand, zero-friction bearings, seems to me to 
be the degree of distortive forces involved in altering tension which, in 
the current system, DO NOT get transmitted to the sounding length.  Of 
course, I realize you are speaking hypothetically, so maybe this whole line 
of concern is beside your immediate point.  On the other hand, I think this 
connects with Ed Sutton's very recent post, also on CAUT.  (I'm waiting to 
see how you'll manage if the topic takes off here AND reawakens on that 
list simultaneously.  Oh, the dangers of cross-posting! )

David Skolnik