Hi Joe, I recently replaced a set of these and wrote about it for the Partial Post. Here is a copy of the text with some photos. One thing to mention straight out is that a previous tech tried to repair the flanges, but it did not last. The Weird Stuff: Replacing Vertical Damper Flanges Bruce Dornfeld, RPT Replacing damper flanges won't come up very often. Old plastic flanges from around the fifties will need replacement. Sometimes weakened springs need to be replaced. My most recent job is a Baldwin studio from 1982. The plastic damper flanges are a poor design which causes them to break where they hold the spring. The symptom is that some dampers stop working completely. The flanges are molded with a stub that sticks out about an eighth of an inch to hold the coil of the damper spring (photo 1). There is a slot in the flange to hold the short end of the spring, also known as the Shepherd's hook. The stub breaks off and the spring comes out or no longer works (photo 2). On this piano a previous technician repaired the flange by drilling a hole and replacing the broken stub with a center pin. This was a short term fix; the flange ruptured where the center pin was inserted (photo 3). On this piano ten of the sixty-seven flanges were broken, so we decided to replace the set. Try to find a set of new parts that will fit as well as possible. The size of the flange and length of the spring are the obvious factors. Also important are the placement of the screw hole and the size and depth of the recess on the flange bottom to help fix the position of the flanges on the rail. The ridge on the action rail to hold the damper flanges should fit properly in the flange's recess. After numbering each damper lever and removing them from the rail, the old flanges can be removed. To ream the new action centers, you might try using an electric screwdriver with a knurled center pin held in a drill chuck (photo 4). The set I had needed a lot of reaming and this method was less likely to push or pull the bushing cloth out of the flange. The holes on the flanges needed to be enlarged slightly to fit on the action rail (photo 5). The ridge on the rail needed to be planed down a little so the flanges could sit firmly on both sides (photos 6 and 7). If the flanges fit great to begin with, I could have skipped these steps, but this was not the case. A small try square against the side of the flange and against the rail ridge confirmed the flanges would sit straight (photo 8). After the damper levers and new flanges are all installed, some minor adjustments should be checked. Make sure the damper heads/felts are spaced well and parallel to each other. Other regulation adjustments should not have changed much unless previous repairs required changes. Checking everything you can while the action is on your workbench will make things go quicker in the home. Bruce Dornfeld, RPT bdornfeld at earthlink.net North Shore Chapter -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <http://ptg.org/pipermail/pianotech.php/attachments/20090614/a5abf54e/attachment-0001.htm> -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: Baldwin damper photo 1.JPG Type: image/jpeg Size: 25995 bytes Desc: not available URL: <http://ptg.org/pipermail/pianotech.php/attachments/20090614/a5abf54e/attachment-0003.jpeg> -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: Baldwin damper photo 3.JPG Type: image/jpeg Size: 24696 bytes Desc: not available URL: <http://ptg.org/pipermail/pianotech.php/attachments/20090614/a5abf54e/attachment-0004.jpeg> -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: Baldwin damper photo 2.JPG Type: image/jpeg Size: 25964 bytes Desc: not available URL: <http://ptg.org/pipermail/pianotech.php/attachments/20090614/a5abf54e/attachment-0005.jpeg>
This PTG archive page provided courtesy of Moy Piano Service, LLC