<DIV>Fred,</DIV> <DIV>Certainly the helper springs can be used to advantage in addressing this problem.  I would adjust the springs so that you would be using a minimal front weight, such as 19 grams at key #1, and creating a smooth front weight curve from there.  Alternately (or in conjunction with) I have had success in reducing both downweight and upweight in those pianos by reducing the size of the knuckles.  Either replacing them with the small Renner knuckle, (not as effective) or reducing the size of the original ones right on the shanks.  Briefly, I have peeled back the buckskin, reduced the core by sanding to the wooden core, leaving some cloth on either side of the core, and gluing on another piece of action cloth or felt skiving on top of the flattened area, rounding the new piece of cloth or skiving so when the knuckle covering is stretched and glued back around, the knuckle itself is still round, only smaller.  I used extra strength glue sticks from the hot glue gun as the glue in this proceedure. Fred Sturm <fssturm@unm.edu> wrote:</DIV> <BLOCKQUOTE class=replbq style="PADDING-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; BORDER-LEFT: #1010ff 2px solid">. . .  I wonder if any of you have experience in addressing weight issues in small Kawai's of this vintage, and would be willing to share. Specifically, I'm wondering if a combination of wipp spring adjustment, adding a bit of lead to keys, and tapering hammers is likely to produce acceptable results. And whether just springs, just lead, or springs and lead would be enough. Thanks, Fred Sturm University of New Mexico _______________________________________________ caut list info: https://www.moypiano.com/resources/#archives</BLOCKQUOTE> Vince Mrykalo University of UtahDo you Yahoo!? <a href="http://us.rd.yahoo.com/mailtag_us/*http://mail.yahoo.com" target="_blank">Yahoo! Mail</a> - More reliable, more storage, less spam