Kent Swafford wrote: >I have a bit of a situation with a B in the studio of a concert pianist. >The studio is a "voicing-intensive" situation and the hammers have been >over-needled with glover's needles. > >(FWIW, I don't use glover's needles and strongly recommend against them, >based on the damage I have seen done with them. They slice hammer felt >open.) > >A large number of these hammers are split open on the surfaces of the >crown on either side of the striking area. Smooth shaping while filing >is impossible due to the fact that the wool that is pushed into the >crevices during filing strokes is not removed, and builds up as ridges. > >The piano does not sound all that bad yet, but my thoughts on this could >change if I get a phone message to the contrary in the next few days. > >Obviously, the hammers will have to be replaced shortly, but I need to >keep this piano functionioning during the months that it will take to >schedule new hammers. > >I have considered soaking the hammers with an extremely dilute juice, >hoping that the fibers would hang together enough afterwords to >facilitate good shaping. > >Any thoughts? > >Kent Swafford >University of Missouri-Kansas City, Conservatory of Music Well, I didn't really want to juice these hammers. They are Ronsons and one assumes that if they have been over-needled, this means, since Ronsons start out relatively soft, that they have already been over-juiced at some point. Newton suggested using a power tool to shape these things. I use the Foredom tool with the band-sander attachment, which appears to have been just what was needed, thank you. I have now accomplished the original objective which was to decrease and make uniform the strike point on the hammers across the scale. The band-sander smoothed these hammers so well that I am even wondering if I will be able to go back to a paddle next filing. The problem remains of how to fit a hammer to the strings when much of the strike point is a hole, but the bottom line is that for the moment, the voicing has been improved enough that voicing is not the highest priority service item for this instrument. This is a teflon-era piano which has had the shank & flanges, wippens, and damper underlevers replaced. A nagging slow-repetition problem (that I assume is geometry-related) remains in this action that I am embarassed to say I have not been able to get a handle on. Next call. Kent Swafford
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