Del, I’ve asked this question of other scale designers and seem to get the same vague answer. The question “high, medium and low” would seem to refer to the percent of tension to breaking point of the wire .Certainly a given wire with a tension at 150 lb. would not address the “high, medium or low” tension question unless one knows the diameter and length of the wire. As you implied, the tonal characteristics change with the tension. Could I assume you are referring to the percent of breaking point, or are you referring to the total tonnage on the piano? Can you clarify? Roger From: Delwin D Fandrich Sent: Wednesday, February 22, 2012 10:53 PM To: pianotech at ptg.org Subject: Re: [pianotech] High tension, low tension? 1) Unless you know the design you have to measure. There is obviously no clear line here. Generally I consider a piano with scaling tensions below 160 lbf (72.5 kgf) through the tenor section to be low-tension scales. Those with scaling tensions above 180 lbf (81.5 kgf) are high-tension scales. Many existing piano scales are more-or-less in the middle and many are a mix of both. In addition to knowing if a given scale has high or low tensions, it is useful to know how a scale gets those tensions. That is, does it have long and thin strings or short and thick strings? Each will have a different tone characteristic. 2) In the best of all worlds each different scale type would be matched to a different soundboard and rib scale and the piano would use hammers selected to match the scaling and the soundboard design. To look at just the extremes, a piano with a long low-tension scale will work best with a light, relatively flexible soundboard and light, resilient hammers. A piano with a short high-tension scale will work best with a heavier, relatively stiffer soundboard assembly and denser, more massive hammers. ddf (Just a short plug for the upcoming PTG Convention—I’ll be presenting an all-day seminar on this topic including demonstrations of various scale types on my string test fixture. —ddf) Delwin D Fandrich Piano Design & Fabrication 6939 Foothill Court SW, Olympia, Washington 98512 USA Phone 360.515.0119 — Cell 360.388.6525 mailto:del at fandrichpiano.com— ddfandrich at gmail.com From: pianotech-bounces at ptg.org [mailto:pianotech-bounces at ptg.org] On Behalf Of lim hock seng Sent: Wednesday, February 22, 2012 8:34 PM To: pianotech at ptg.org Subject: [pianotech] High tension, low tension? Hi list, 1. How do we know whether a piano has high or low tension scaling? 2. Do we voiced differently for these scalings? Bless Lim -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <https://www.moypiano.com/ptg/pianotech.php/attachments/20120227/6b9d6212/attachment.htm>
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