Bob writes: << Am I stuck to not being able to play at speed--no Chopin or Schubert. What else can we try? --no wippen helpers, at least I can't find any. And changing the location of the capstan, knuckle, will kill the warranty. >> Would they refuse to honor a soundboard fracture, or a pinning freeze-up because you changed the capstans? If so, then, how much is that warranty worth? Also: >>The supposedly "correct" solution is to lower the hammer weight. However, since the hammers are already light, I'm certain that'd kill the voice of the piano--and Renner says that's not good to do to their hammers. Besides, we don't think we can take off enough on the hammers to get the AR down to the 5.5 goal.<< The hammer weight doesn't change the action ratio. IMHO, the optimum hammer weight is decided by the tone, the action ratio then must be made to produce a well-playing action with that weight. You may find that moving the stack distally by 2 mm will make everything work just fine, (or you may run into all kind of interference problems.) You may also find room to move the whippen rail distally, rather than changing capstans. This can make big improvements on some actions. Remember, when you move the capstans, the change in ratio is greater inre the whippen arc than the key arc. Since the whippen flange center to capstan contact point is much smaller than the distance from the balance rail pin to the contact point, a 1 mm change represents a significantly larger alteration of the whippen ratio than the key ratio. Moving the stack changes the ratio without altering the keys. Good luck, Ed Foote RPT http://www.uk-piano.org/edfoote/index.html www.uk-piano.org/edfoote/well_tempered_piano.html <BR><BR><BR>**************<BR>New MapQuest Local shows what's happening at your destination. Dining, Movies, Events, News & more. Try it out!<BR> (http://local.mapquest.com/?ncid=emlcntnew00000001)</HTML>
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