[pianotech] Young Chang PG-185

[Stephen Grattan]

Hi Paul,

When Samick purchased the Pramberger name from Mr. Prambergers widow- all they 
got was the name and not the design or intellectual rights.  They put the name 
on one of their stock designs at the time.  The Pramberger design continues to 
be manufactured and sold by YC as Pramberger Signature Series.
 
Steve Grattan
Lost Chord Clinic




________________________________
From: Paul McCloud <pmc033 at earthlink.net>
To: pianotech at ptg.org
Sent: Fri, September 14, 2012 9:33:24 AM
Subject: Re: [pianotech] Young Chang PG-185

Hi, Noah:
I agree with Dean.  The original Pramberger series from Y.C. was definitely a 
huge improvement from the G series.  There were some issues that cropped up in 
them a few years later, mainly in the action, like twisting hammer shanks and 
other things I don't remember.  Nothing really serious.  You know that Mr. 
Pramberger was a third generation Steinway engineer, and he incorporated many of 
the design features of Steinway pianos in his redesign of these Pramberger 
pianos.  One was the tapering of the soundboard, which Steinway does by hand.  
The Pramberger design used a CNC router for this.  It really made the bass a lot 
clearer and deeper.  The tone across he break was very smooth.  But, you do need 
to check everything carefully.  I don't think these had the same heavy 
hammer/key lead problems that the G series seemed to have, and of course, they 
don't have the famous action bracket problem either.  

I think Samick got the Pramberger designs from Young Chang in their merger years 
ago, so I'm not sure if they're still being made and sold with the same name.
It is a shame that Joseph Pramberger died a few years ago at a relatively young 
age.  He was a very humble guy, down to earth.  He came to our store once, to 
demonstrate the new pianos he was redesigning.  He explained his philosophy and 
intent for his new ideas, and how he came to work for Young Chang.  He joked 
that he had to be careful about mentioning anything to anybody over there, 
because they would take every idea seriously and implement it immediately.  One 
of the things he said of his pianos was that he didn't want to build a camel.  
Meaning, he wanted to make every feature of the piano an integrated whole, not 
just something that was thrown in haphazardly, as some animals like camels seem 
to be.  His analogy, not mine.  In his demonstration, he showed how he used a 
"thump" test to determine where to thin the soundboard and change other 
parameters to get the best sound response from the board.  It was an interesting 
talk, made to the local techs and any piano teachers that were interested.
Go check it out.
FWIW, my take.
Paul McCloud
San Diego

----- Original Message -----
From: "Noah Frere" <noahfrere at gmail.com>
To: pianotech at ptg.org
Sent: Thursday, September 13, 2012 7:13:12 AM
Subject: [pianotech] Young Chang PG-185

First, an apology for having lost my Pierce Piano Atlas. 

My research online indicates that the PG-185 was designed by Pramberger, and 
therefore must be a 1995 or later model. However, another tech dated this piano 
with serial #G054761 as a 1990. 


Furthermore, is this model significantly better than the G series? Is this a 
good piano? I know someone who may want to buy it, but it's in another city 
3hours away so I don't want to just hop over there just yet. 


Thanks, 
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