Kimball cord repair

[Arlin Hall]

I had to do several of these on an old schroeder grand a while back.

I drilled out the old cord/plug, all the way through the repetition lever.
I then, through trial and error, determined the proper size of a loop of
crocheting (sp?) string to use as a replacement for the cord.  Once this
size was determined I built a jig with a couple of nails s[aced out on a
piece of wood so I could make a bunch of them very quickly.  In each loop,
I tied in a tiny two hole button that would hold the string on the bottom
side of the repetition lever and keep it from pulling through.  Thus I
didn't
have to deal with glue.  Out of a paper clip I fashioned a small hook to
reach down through the hole I had drilled to fish the loop up through the
repetition lever, and pulled it over the spring hook.  It really worked very
well, and once I had it figured out the general method, it was very very
fast.

I'm sure this is not described very well, but I would be happy to go over
the
method with anyone by phone, email, whatever.  Or, I could try to draw some
sketches to illustrate.

Hope this is of use to someone.

Arlin

-----Original Message-----
From: Avery [mailto:avery1 at houston.rr.com]
Sent: Monday, June 19, 2006 10:25 PM
To: Pianotech List
Subject: Re: Kimball cord repair


Paul,

I'd like to know this, also. I just replaced one of those on a Baldwin SD-10
and I had hell doing it. Drilling out the plug/dowel in the jack and
getting the new
cord in there. I hope someone has some good suggestions about how to
do this better.
Mine worked, but I'd sure like to know a better way of doing it!!!!

Avery Todd
University of Houston

At 09:24 PM 6/19/2006, you wrote:
>Hello list,
>
>I'm repairing on old Kimball grand action, the type that has a short loop
of
>cord (for the repetition spring) coming out the back of each jack.  Two of
>these cords are broken, and I expect many more are near the breaking point.
>How does one replace these cords?  I may end up replacing all 88 of them,
so
>I need to learn how to do this properly.
>
>One more thing, in an emergency situation, what could you use if you didn't
>have the right type of cord -- string? Dental floss? Fishing line?
>
>Thank,
>Paul Mulik