I think I've tried just about every technique known to man- or woman-kind to get the lacquer out including making a tray so I would soak the whole set of hammers-strike surface down-in various thinners overnight. Sometimes my initial reaction has been, "Oh, great, this is actually working!" only to later find that I just can't get the resilience, the "bounce," back. At best, I think I've been able to make some of them less bad. But less bad is a far way from great. For me the obvious solution is to not put the stuff in there to begin with. If the piano has an appropriate and working soundboard and a half-way reasonable scale it then becomes a question of choosing an appropriate hammer to match. If I find myself in a situation where the hammers require anything more than just a bit of hardening up in the high treble and, at worst, a bit of light shoulder stiffening it's an indication that I chose the wrong hammer. That, or the piano has serious problems. Or I have the wrong client and my client has the wrong technician. ddf Delwin D Fandrich Piano Design & Fabrication 620 South Tower Avenue Centralia, Washington 98531 USA del at fandrichpiano.com ddfandrich at gmail.com Phone 360.736.7563 From: caut-bounces at ptg.org [mailto:caut-bounces at ptg.org] On Behalf Of Dale Erwin Sent: Sunday, February 13, 2011 7:40 AM To: caut at ptg.org Subject: Re: [CAUT] Rinsing lacquer from hammers Hi Horace Ok, so its getting clearer. SO to be crysta,l are the hammers put upside down or crown down into a thinner solution bath and left submerged for 24 hours and then a fresh wash of stuff to hose down the entire set to wash the lac out after that? I'm curious. I learned from Jack Brand (during the Weickert felt trials) at Wurzen felt that wool fibers are hollow, which is why they can hold so much moisture. ie rugs, sweaters etc...... SO you see the lac. not only surrounds and stiffens the fibers on the outside but also on the inside. With the hammer acting as a sponge like device how successful is the lacquer extraction process. IE. 100 %...50%. T'would seem like it will be difficult to persuade the felt fibers to release the internal saturation of hollow fibers. Thoughts. war stories? -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <http://ptg.org/pipermail/caut.php/attachments/20110213/08517406/attachment.htm>
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