On Nov 29, 2010, at 1:37 PM, McCoy, Alan wrote: > Would there be a consensus preference? Would there be a measureable > tonal difference? Perceived or measureable difference in speed, > predictability, consistency, or power? Did the teflon era close > because technicians weren’t able to deal with the bushings > effectively, or because pianists weren’t able to control the beasts, > or were able to but disliked the extra hurdle posed by the parts? > > Alan With respect to "touch" (perception of the feeling of resistance at the key), I doubt it is significant. I guess you are saying there is more of a "spongy" area with felt bushings, where one additional gram will mean the key starts to go down sluggishly, and it might take three grams to get the same response as you get with one additional gram in the teflon action. It seems to me that there is so much potential for variance in all the other friction points, especially key bushings to pins and knuckle to jack/rep, that breaking loose the hammer flange suddenly as opposed to gradually (within 2 - 3 grams) would simply not register. Tonal differences there may well be, though. Consistency and predictability are certainly more easily achievable, at least theoretically: machining teflon can be done more precisely than packing felt, as the felt is not going to be as consistent a material. I'd say the reason teflon failed from the standpoint of public acceptance was pretty simple: catastrophic action failure (seizing up); clicking noises everywhere; technicians who didn't have a clue what to do; lots of sharing of experiences on a rumor level. I have found it interesting that a customer of mine has found it very difficult to get offers for a teflon II (the large bushings with ribs) M simply because of the bad press. There is nothing whatsoever wrong with the function of the piano, and in over fifteen years of servicing it not a single problem arose. But the public "knows" that teflon is bad. Regards, Fred Sturm fssturm at unm.edu http://www.youtube.com/fredsturm -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <http://ptg.org/pipermail/caut.php/attachments/20101129/c67eb8cf/attachment-0001.htm>
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