[CAUT] VSProfelt vs alcohol/water/softener vs steam

[Dan Reed]

Fred, Thanks for researching this.I'm very interested in using steam 
for puffing up compacted felt, and am looking forward to your 
technique. How to keep the glue contact surface intact in the key 
bushings is my question.

Dan Reed
Dallas, Tx

On Mar 12, 2009, at 9:07 AM, Fred Sturm wrote:

> 	I finally found the opportunity to do a comparison of VSProfelt with 
> an emulated mixture of alcohol, water, and fabric softener. I did 
> wippen cushions and key bushings on an upright. For the key bushings, 
> I also did a comparison with my usual steam method.
> 	My emulated mixture was approximately 12% softener, 18% alcohol, and 
> 70% water (the figures are a result of adding to a 5 mm line for 
> softener, 15 mm with 70% isolpropyl alcohol, and 40 with water - those 
> lines being cumulative. This was not utterly precise, just a 
> convenient guess, and then I did the calculations of percentage). I 
> think the VSProfelt is actually lower in alcohol and higher in 
> softener, and it also has silicon oil added in some formulation. VSP 
> is milkier looking than what I made, and it doesn't wick quite as fast 
> into the felt - hence my guess about more softener and less alcohol.
> 	Results? A tie. VSP works quite nicely. So does a mix of alcohol, 
> water and softener. I couldn't tell any difference in the results 
> whatsoever, other than the lubricant in VSP.
> 	The tie was between VSP and my emulation solution. Steam was 
> significantly faster, and slightly more effective - key bushings only 
> in this case. I think the more effective part came from the steam 
> re-expanding the wood where it might have been squeezed/eased 
> previously.
> 	For the bushings I had the keys in two Spurlock clamps. I applied the 
> liquids using a tapered, pointed paintbrush (in preference to a hypo 
> oiler, that takes longer because of the need to apply to each side 
> separately). I did one key clamp with liquids, the other with steam. 
> For the liquids, I alternated between sharps and naturals for the 
> different solutions, changing the alternation when I changed from 
> balance to front rail. The full steaming and ironing process took 
> considerably less time than applying the liquids and inserting the 
> cauls.
> 	I'll send a separate post following with photos of the steam process.
> Regards,
> Fred Sturm
> University of New Mexico
> fssturm at unm.edu
>
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