unusual wippens (Ludwig grand)

[mccleskey112 at bellsouth.net]

Tom: Yes. I regulated one about two weeks ago. Not much to do but take up 
the lost motion and set the letoff. Pretty scary though. I have actually ran 
across a few other grands that didn't have repitition levers but to may 
recollection it was the first one to regulate.
Gerald McC
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Tom Sivak" <tvaktvak at sbcglobal.net>
To: "pianotech" <pianotech at ptg.org>
Sent: Tuesday, February 05, 2008 3:02 PM
Subject: unusual wippens (Ludwig grand)


> List
>
> I was asked to tune and evaluate an old Ludwig grand
> for a new client.  She had gotten the piano for free,
> and it was horribly out of tune.  She had plans to
> renovate the piano and wanted to know if it was "worth
> it".  I didn't have to drive there to tell her the
> answer, but I did go and tune it and then took the
> action out to examine the condition.
>
> Holy cow.  I have never seen an action like this
> before.   The wippens had no repetition lever!   It
> was as if it were simply missing.  But it wasn't.  It
> was designed that way.
>
> The wippen consisted of a straight piece of wood with
> the heel on the under side and the flange on the back.
> There was a little flange, like an upright piano
> action flange that held the jack to the wippen.  There
> was a long spring extending up from that straight
> piece of wood.  The spring looked like a really big
> hammer return spring on an upright, and indeed, that
> was its function here.    There was also a button to
> regulate the position of the jack under the knuckle,
> forward and aft, but no repetition lever, no window,
> nothing.  The jack just stood there like a little
> soldier, holding up the hammer.
>
> The hammer shank had a Brambach-style knuckle, and
> next to the knuckle was a little post at a 90 degree
> angle to the shaft that had a loop of silk on the end
> of it.  The hammer return spring  hooked into that
> little loop and helped the hammer come back away from
> the string, along with gravity, of course.
>
> Has anyone ever seen anything like this?  (I guess I
> know the answer to that one, too, but I still have to
> ask it.)
>
> Tom Sivak
> Chicago
>
>