We should just stipulate that when anyone says "improvement" you read it as "change" so we can stop hearing you drone on on this point every time someone offers some insight or suggestions about improvement, yes improvement, based on their own research and experience. Further, how can you categorically state that "there are probably at least if not 10 times as many who would not (see it as an improvement). What evidence do you have for that? That being said, and for those actually interested in the phenomenon, overly flexible keys are easy to demonstrate by both holding the back of the key and flexing it down toward the front rail as well as empirically when the upper end of the dynamic range hits a ceiling beyond which the pianist cannot achieve a louder fortissimo in spite of an increase in key acceleration (referred to as action saturation in the articles). It's particularly a problem on D's with accelerated action bearings because of the length of the key and the reduction in key height reducing the stiffness (as we know from our rib discussions) by a factor of ^3. Once you stiffen the key, that false ceiling disappears. David Love davidlovepianos at comcast.net www.davidlovepianos.com -----Original Message----- From: pianotech-bounces at ptg.org [mailto:pianotech-bounces at ptg.org] On Behalf Of Richard Brekne Sent: Friday, May 02, 2008 2:30 AM To: pianotech at ptg.org Subject: Flexy S&S D Keys Hi Del and Terry, Terry, how did you ascertain that there was <<too much>> flex in the keys ? Del, what is wrong with calling a spade a spade ? Honestly folks... any <<improvement>> in an actions performance is wholly a result of the users reaction to the change. There is no inherent improvment.... only a change in configuration. Thing is that for every person that would equate this change with an <<improvement>> there are probably at least that many if not 10 times as many who would not. You make the action stiffer when you make it stiffer... goes without saying... if thats a good thing for the pianist in question fine... if its not...what ...are we going to get all down on the guy and snub our noses at him ? Why not just call a change a change and leave it at that .... along with making it clear to the customer what the change will do... pros and cons. Because there is always pros and cons. I'd like to know what the criteria for judging these particular keys to have to much flex are ? Terry ? Cheers RicB Have him or her go back to the August and December 1996 Journals and read the two articles I wrote about energy losses in piano actions. In one of those articles I described how to improve (I realize the idea of "improving" anything to do with the piano is subjective so perhaps I should just say "change") these keys. Basically I removed the so-called Accelerated Action "rockers" and replaced them with normal thin felt punchings. I then used the space gained to accommodate maple plates of equal thickness (4 mm comes to mind but you should check) glued to the bottom of the keys. Did wonders to "change" the performance of the action and the piano. Del
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