[CAUT] HELP

[A440A at aol.com]

Paul writes:

<<  I thought I grabbed the acetone to put some 
below the staple to help the fundamentals, but instead, grabbed the 
lacquer!  After seeing what I had done, I quickly grabbed the acetone and 
tried to dilute what I had done.  I'll check it out Sunday or Monday after 
all has dried, but;  Have I ruined these hammers?!?!? 

I doubt it.  What happens below the staple can easily be manipulated by 
working farther up in the hammer. At some point down there, the maker even has a 
thick slab of glue that has wicked into the hammer felt! 

>>I thought the Ronsen's didn't need laquer and such. 

    Depends on many things.  Any hammer can be put in a situation where it is 
too hard or too soft for the purpose. 
 
>>I was disappointed 
with the initial response.  Now, the bass is good with a 4:1 laquer 
treatment on the lower shoulders--twice in the single strings, but the 
killer octave area is really weak and tinny. >>

      I suppose there is a philosophical perspective at work here ("The flow 
of energy through a system tends to organize that system".)  However,  I don't 
understand why time is left out of the equation, ie, hammers, initially, do 
NOT sound like they will after the first say, 40 hours of play.  I think there 
is a reason to do nothing, initially.  (This isn't usually applicable to the 
concert stage.)  
      Playing the hammer, after the felt has been stretched, pressed, glued, 
shaped, tapered, will cause the felt to change. It moves around, seeking 
equilibrium between the pressure and stretch.  Not only will the surface compact, 
and the felt directly below the strings begin to harden,  but the fundamental 
structure of the bulk of the felt will become more resilient, (assuming it is 
accepting of a needle, and not been soaked in a hardener).  
     I look for a hammer that produces various spectra according to the force 
of blow.  Plotted against our hearing bias, there is something very 
non-linear about all this, in terms of response. To get that, for me, requires a 
graduated density in the felt, from the contact down to the core.  Early in my 
career, I assumed that the rock hard level should be reached only at the bottom of 
the felt core, and the softening would be spread over the entire dimension 
from there to strike surface.  This allowed for a maximum range of tone, from 
foggy to brilliant, but the weak wristed need not play:  it took a lot of muscle 
to use all the range.  Comments like, "sounds good, but it's a lotta work to 
get tone", etc.   I have since changed my idea on this.  
         I have gotten good results by leaving a lot more of the hammer's 
"heart" in its original compression, and creating the "non-linear spring"  in a 
smaller zone, nearer to the surface.  It is a little trickier, but allows for a 
longer hammer life and ease of voicing.  A big part of this is letting the 
hammer break in before I begin doing things to it.  I have used so many Renner 
Blues, that I can needle them on the bench, before I do anything else.  They 
usually sound a little "cotton-ish" at first, but after a week or two of daily 
play, they require some medium deep needles up around 10:00-11:30 on the 
shoulders to loosen them up to their final voice.  I rarely need to needle at 12:00 
on these hammers.  
    The last set of Abel's and Ronsen's have behaved much the same way, with 
a few differences. These were mainly in the sense of how quickly they broke in 
and the felt seemed a little less resiliant, (judging from the way the 
filed-off pile of felt felt).  
   Loudness depends on the upper partials,  power requires the lower ones.  
To combine the two, in an evenly graduated way, is the art of producing a piano 
with a "malleable tone".  Pianists instinctively like this, as it allows a 
musical control that is unavailable on a piano that starts and ends with one 
tonal character.   
       
Regards, 
         

Ed Foote RPT 
http://www.uk-piano.org/edfoote/index.html
www.uk-piano.org/edfoote/well_tempered_piano.html
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