Steven~ For what it's worth, I installed a set of Brooks/Abel AE171 "natural" felt hammers recently on a 1968 Baldwin F (7') grand, at the request of a customer who had heard good things about them and wanted to try them out (I was curious about them too, having installed, and having been very favorably impressed with the installations of a number of sets of Wally's other Abel Encore hammers). The "naturals" turned out to be very wonderful hammers, and needed very little voicing. Part of this may be to be that the felt seems to me to be, in both weight and density, somewhere in-between the regular Abel Encores and the Abel "lites", -which turned out just about perfect for this piano. (This may have to do with the different treatment; the "natural" felt is treated with enzymes, rather than acid which is the conventional treatment. These hammers definitely look more like felt that hasn't been "bleached".) The 17 lb felt is necessary, I feel, for the larger piano, although Wally may also have them available in 15 lb felt if you want to try for an even lighter hammer. We found that, as Wally claims, this natural felt is amazingly resilient. We are still waiting to see how it wears with this particular pianist and piano, but apparently others have reported these hammers have minimal packing and brightening even with heavy use. With these hammers you should still plan on tapering/weight- reduction with something like the Spurlock tapering jig, and a pharmacist's scale, to get them close to the target touchweight, (but they do tend to be lighter to begin with, so you won't need to do a lot of tapering.) The "naturals' come with nice wide shoulders (At least 11 mm wide on the set I got - if you are into that). I shot for, after boring, tapering and tailing, around 9 grams for hammer #1, 8 grams on hammer #21, and 7 grams on hammer #40. This will get you pretty close to the ideal touchweight (around 50 grams). The Baldwin F I installed the hammers on had a Renner "Schwander" type action. There wasn't much lead in the keys. (A max of 3 medium leads in the lowest bass notes, two leads in the middle, one in the high notes, and in the highest notes, none. Hammer weight out of the box for the naturals was #1 - 10.8 grams, #21 - 9.7 grams, and #40 - 8.3 grams. I count on the tapering to remove between 1 and 2 grams from each hammer (high treble closer to 1, low bass closer to 2.) I tapered the hammers to 13/32" (10.5mm) at the crown to 5/16" (8mm) at the tip of the tail. The customer was looking for a more "mellow" sound (more fundamental) but which still had a certain amount of ring to it (just the right higher overtones). We were able to get that "almost" right out of the box (of course, I'm taking for granted all the usual setup: shank heating and squaring of hammers, crown and string levelling, string seating, alignment of hammers to strings, etc, etc ;-) Thus, "out of the box" is a very relative term... ) Other possible hammers: Aside from that, the RennerUSA "Blues" have always been one of my favorites. Very consistent, very predictable, and very wonderful as well. After having installed many, many sets, I know just about exactly what to do with them for any given piano. For the Baldwin 7', with a treble bore distance of 1 7/8" (nominally) I found I would need to order the G4M-L's to assure a 1" tail length (or the G3M-Ls if you want a lighter hammer) The Renner blues generally require more needling than the Abel "natural" hammers, but when you get them where you want them, they are truly rewarding, and also are very long-lasting. Both of these brands of hammers start you out with a superb quality of felt. >From there, it's what you do with them. ~Kendall Ross Bean PianoFinders _____ From: erwinspiano at aol.com [mailto:erwinspiano at aol.com] Sent: Thursday, November 20, 2008 4:58 PM To: pianotech at ptg.org Subject: [pianotech] Weickert Felt -New Baldwin Hammers Steven Marinelli told me that the Abel Selects from Piano-tek have been discontinued. I bought the last two sets from him. They were a good choice for certain soundboard systems. However one set was incredibly bright & pingy and required much voicing to get them under control and I am concerned about the rebounding effect. From what you say it is MHO this is not what your client needs. I just opened 4 sets of the Ronsen Weickert hammers and subjected them to some initial testing. I use a no. 6 needle inserted in various areas of the hammer to test for density,stiffness & resilience. I also have a device some of you have seen called the Erwin -Davis flex-o-meter. Which is a hand held press which can squeeze/flex the hammer so a visual inspection of hammer squash/felt movement can be observed. These hammers are strong yet flexible. This type of strong flexing movement is responible for the powerful sustain the testers are experiencing. The feel of the needle is firm,But they go all the way in. The trebles are nicely dense for clear and solid tone production & should produce a powerful sound with a minimum of needles if any. Ray,Jack & I have been working to produce the felt/hammers so it require only light to no needling in order to get the desired result. You Know? The perfect hammer. lol Ray just recieved 6 more sheets & we Wurzen/Jack has tweaked the bass to get it where we want it. Dense. The felt smells alive & the feel is like silk. We cut open some hammers & they demonstate a lot of tension. I've been testing every set here & compiling data as each testor weighs in. SO far it's all very enthusiastic. The latest is Star Taylor with C-7. He loved it. I'll ask him to post. Starr? I'll have more soon. I would recommend the 16 lb for the Big Baldwin. Renner Shanks is a great choice...of course Dale Erwin I second the hammer selection and definitely Renner Shanks. Al G From: David Love <mailto:davidlovepianos at comcast.net> Subject: Re: [pianotech] New Baldwin Hammers Depends on the tonal goal. I would opt for either a set of the new Ronsen Weikert felt hammers or a set of Abel Select (new series) that Pianotek is selling. The Abels will be a bit firmer. Renner for shanks. Be prepared to reassess the action leverage. Hello, Does anyone have a suggestion for a full set of hammers, shanks, and knuckles for a Baldwin 7' grand built in 1982. Baldwin/Gibson gave me some information for contacts to answer my question but lets just say no one is calling back. Thanks for the help. Steven Hopp PianoWorks Studio 600 Liddon #64 Midland, TX. 79705 hoppsmusic at hotmail.com _____ Access your email online and on the go with Windows Live Hotmail. Sign up today. <http://windowslive.com/Explore/Hotmail?ocid=TXT_TAGLM_WL_hotmail_acq_access _112008> _____ Traveling over the river or through the woods this holiday season? Get <http://pr.atwola.com/promoclk/100000075x1212816426x1200798402/aol?redir=htt p://www.mapquest.com/toolbar?ncid=emlwemqmq00000001> the MapQuest Toolbar. Directions, Traffic, Gas Prices & More! -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <http://ptg.org/pipermail/pianotech_ptg.org/attachments/20081120/f362f2c5/attachment.html>
This PTG archive page provided courtesy of Moy Piano Service, LLC