<div>Thank you, Ed</div> <div> </div> <div>Your first sentence states directly what I was hinting at in my last point, namely that since it would be very difficult to predict what resonating qualities a shank/hammer assembly will have once the shank ends are trimmed off, it may be rather pointless to try to use shank pitch as a primary sorting criterion. And your second sentence reminds me of what Ted Sambell taught us many years ago (I was one of his students back in the '80's): always listen to the tone of the shanks before installing them. The ones that go "plink" can go in the piano; the ones that go "plock" can go somewhere else. There is no sorting by pitch, just a test that weeds out the shanks that are more likely either to break due to irregularities in the grain, or to adversely affect the tone by flexing too much, damping tone, etc.</div> <div> </div> <div>Thank you, David, for your comments too. It
sounds like there is more to be gained by sorting shanks according to what effect they will have on the touch rather than what pitch they produce before being coupled with hammers and mounted on rails. As long as they are good and stiff (they go "plink" rather than "plock") they should do the job.</div> <div> </div> <div>Am I reading you correctly?</div> <div> </div> <div>Albert</div> <div><BR><BR><B><I>Ed Sutton <ed440@mindspring.com></I></B> wrote:</div> <BLOCKQUOTE class=replbq style="PADDING-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; BORDER-LEFT: #1010ff 2px solid"> <STYLE type=text/css>BLOCKQUOTE { PADDING-BOTTOM: 0px; PADDING-TOP: 0px } DL { PADDING-BOTTOM: 0px; PADDING-TOP: 0px } UL { PADDING-BOTTOM: 0px; PADDING-TOP: 0px } OL { PADDING-BOTTOM: 0px; PADDING-TOP: 0px } LI { PADDING-BOTTOM: 0px; PADDING-TOP: 0px } </STYLE> <META content="MSHTML 6.00.6000.16643" name=GENERATOR> <DIV><FONT face=Arial
size=2>David-</FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Once the hammers are hung, the "pitch" of the shank/hammer will be altered, so I don't see how the "shank tone" as such is significant.</FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>However, when all other factors are the same, it may be an indicator of the stiffness of the wood, which may influence the response of the action. </FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>For example, my sense in a short trial of Bruce Clark's action with carbon fiber shanks was that it was fast and even in response and delivered easy power for the effort. But that was a short trial by a low-skilled performer, and there are many other creative adaptations in his design that make it work so well.</FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Nevertheless, those carbon fiber tubes should be able to deliver a very perfect and even "plinck" line. not to mention even weight and
stiffness.</FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Ed Sutton</FONT></DIV> <BLOCKQUOTE dir=ltr style="PADDING-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; BORDER-LEFT: #000000 2px solid; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px"> <DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial">----- Original Message ----- </DIV> <DIV style="BACKGROUND: #e4e4e4; FONT: 10pt arial; font-color: black"><B>From:</B> <A title=stanwood@tiac.net href="mailto:stanwood@tiac.net">David C. Stanwood</A> </DIV> <DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>To:</B> <A title=caut@ptg.org href="mailto:caut@ptg.org">College and University Technicians</A> </DIV> <DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>Sent:</B> Wednesday, May 14, 2008 6:03 PM</DIV> <DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>Subject:</B> Re: [CAUT] strikeweight</DIV> <DIV><BR></DIV> <DIV>Dear Albert,</DIV> <DIV><BR></DIV> <DIV>Great work and very interesting and important ideas you are working with! My comment: Most of the dead weight is
concentrated in the flange and flange/knuckle end of the shank and I would imagine that for that reason the dead weight value might relate so much to it's effect on tone... </DIV> <DIV><BR></DIV> <DIV>I would be very interested to see additional data using Shank Strike Weight (SS) instead of the dead weight of the Flange/Shank assembly. This value measures the weight of the shank tipped on a roller bearing with the flange oriented vertically so that it's weight is not measured. The end of the shank rests on the scale. Values are usually aroun 1.4g for narrow shanks and 1.8g for regular shanks. We routinely sort shanks, within each type, by weight, then hang the hammers, then measure Strikeweights, then add or subtract hammer weight to smooth the strikeweights to a curve of our choosing.</DIV> <DIV><BR></DIV> <DIV>The "thinking" is as follows: Shank Strike Weights can very within a shank type within a set by as much as
0.6g. These variations don't show up in the StrikeWeight measure but when we measure the Strikeweight and make changes in hammer weight to smooth the curve we may be changing hammer weight to compensate for a variation in SS. .6g of SS will not have the same inertial moment as .6g of hammer weight because the center of weight is different. (a physicist could explaing this more eloquantly than me). So by sorting the SS by weight we theoretically make the inertial moments of the shank/hammer more even as related to smooth Strike Weights.</DIV> <DIV><BR></DIV> <DIV>Here is a drawing of the setup:</DIV> <DIV><BR></DIV> <DIV>http://www.stanwoodpiano.com/ss.jpg</DIV> <DIV><BR></DIV> <DIV>Hope this helps.</DIV> <DIV><BR></DIV> <DIV>David Stanwood </DIV> <DIV><BR></DIV> <DIV><BR></DIV> <BLOCKQUOTE cite="" type="cite">Hello List</BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE cite="" type="cite"><BR><I><B>Chris Solliday <csolliday@rcn.com></B></I>
wrote ('way back on Feb 20):<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE><FONT face=Arial size=-1>Alot of good ideas and ways for producing some very refined work are being floated regarding shank radius weight and hammerweight which combine to produce strikeweight and the action's main contribution to overall tone. ...</FONT></BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE>...<FONT face=Arial size=-1>I pre-sort the shanks heavy to light bass to treble before I channel them and then again after channeling them. I too find that this reduces the quantity of the variation if not the relative variation. I do not make a spreadsheet until that point after the second sorting. ...</FONT></BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE><FONT face=Arial size=-1>...I may be going over the shanks twice but I have much less work in the end.</FONT></BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE><FONT face=Arial size=-1>I am intrigued at the possibility of working shank tone into the equation and will be first looking for a correlation
between pitch and weight.</FONT></BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE><FONT face=Arial size=-1>Thanks,</FONT></BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE><FONT face=Arial size=-1>Chris Solliday</FONT><BR></BLOCKQUOTE></BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE cite="" type="cite"><BR></BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE cite="" type="cite">This is my first posting to this list, so I hope at least some of you find what I have to say interesting and/or useful. Back around mid-February a series of threads ran on this list entitled "Shank to Hammer weight spreadsheet", "strikeweight", and "Shank Pitch". The comments at the very end of Chris Solliday's post (see above) particularly caught my attention, so I thought I'd do a little "tinking" and weighing to generate some data which Chris (or anyone else) might find useful.</BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE cite="" type="cite"> </BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE cite="" type="cite">My data-gathering proceeded as follows:</BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE cite=""
type="cite"> </BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE cite="" type="cite">Taking a box of new Renner shanks with flanges for Steinway, I first separated the "regular" from the "thinned" shanks; the set contained 59 and 31 shanks respectively. Then I listened to the pitch of the shanks and arranged them in order from lowest to highest. Interestingly, both groups of shanks fell into the same overall pitch range, i.e. the major third A#5 to D6. The thinned shanks covered a slightly narrower range, but that is probably due to the fact that there were fewer of them.</BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE cite="" type="cite"> </BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE cite="" type="cite">Next, I weighed each shank/flange assembly and recorded its weight, to the nearest tenth of a gram. This was just the dead weight of each assembly on the scale.</BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE cite="" type="cite"> </BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE cite="" type="cite">Next, using a Correx gauge, I
measured centre pin friction, also to the nearest tenth of a gram. This involved some estimating and averaging, but I used a consistent technique, so I think the numbers are pretty good.</BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE cite="" type="cite"> </BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE cite="" type="cite">I entered these data into an Excel file, and generated charts from them in order to visually illustrate whatever correlations might exist. The file is attached, including charts - have a look. The data series with the connected blue dots represent the regular shanks; the unconnected pink dots represent the thinned shanks. The lowest- and highest-pitched thinned shanks are numbered to correspond with the regular shanks which had the most closely matching pitches; the rest of the thinned shanks are distributed as evenly as possible between those two extremes. Distributing them this way enabled me to plot them all on the
same graphs in a somewhat meaningful way.</BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE cite="" type="cite"> </BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE cite="" type="cite">Finally, to further explore the relationships of shank thickness and shank length to shank pitch, I altered three regular shanks as follows. The first one, which had an initial weight of 7.0 g (including flange), I thinned substantially, removing 0.5 g of material. The pitch of this shank dropped by about a minor 2nd. The second one, which had an initial weight of 6.9 g (including flange), I shortened by approximately 24-25 mm, equivalent to 0.4 g of material; the pitch of this shank rose by about a perfect 4th. The third one, which had an initial weight of 8.5 g (it had a larger flange attached), I first thinned by 0.5 g, which lowered the pitch by a little less than a major 2nd. Then I cut off shorter segments of approximately 7 mm each (each weighing a little under 0.2 g);
each of these cuts raised the pitch about a major 2nd; the cumulative effect of these three cuts was a pitch rise of about a tritone. Altogether, this last shank ended up thinner, shorter, and about a major third higher in pitch than where it was at the beginning.</BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE cite="" type="cite"> </BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE cite="" type="cite">Some observations/conclusions:</BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE cite="" type="cite"> </BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE cite="" type="cite">1. As I mentioned above, both the regular and thinned shanks fell into the same overall pitch range, i.e. the major third A#5 to D6. Hence, if one is going to sort shanks strictly on the basis of pitch, the regular and thinned shanks will end up being interspersed.</BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE cite="" type="cite"> </BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE cite="" type="cite">2. There is a significant amount of overlap in the weight ranges of the regular and thinned
shanks. So if one is going to sort shanks strictly on the basis of dead weight, again the regular and thinned shanks will end up being interspersed.</BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE cite="" type="cite"> </BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE cite="" type="cite">3. The trendlines in the "Pitch vs. Weight" chart seem to indicate that, as a general rule, heavier shanks have a higher pitch. For two reasons, I suspect that the variations in pitch are primarily a result of differences in wood density from shank to shank. First, because the substantial thinning I did on two of the shanks I altered resulted in pitch changes of less than a major 2nd, I doubt that the slight dimensional variations which may exist after Renner's precise manufacturing process are likely to result in pitch differences amounting to a major 3rd. Second, the fact that the regular and thinned shanks produce pitches that fall within the same range suggests that something
other than dimensional variations are responsible for the pitch variations. Another obviously potential source of variation in the weighing process is differences in the weights of the flanges. But I suspect that if one took the trouble to weigh the flanges separately, although there would be some variation, the data would generate a flat trendline. Anyone wishing to test this hypothesis is welcome to do so; right now I don't have time.</BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE cite="" type="cite"> </BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE cite="" type="cite">4. The random distribution of tighter and looser flanges throughout the entire range of pitches, and the flat trendlines in the "Pitch vs. Friction" chart seem to indicate that the pitch of the shanks is not affected by the pinning (although I do believe the pinning does affect the tone in the piano). To test this conclusion a little further, I took a relatively tight assembly, treated it
with CLP to reduce the centre pin friction, and listened to the pitch again; there was no change in pitch.</BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE cite="" type="cite"> </BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE cite="" type="cite">5. Removing material from the end of a shank has a significantly greater effect on the shank's pitch than does removing an equivalent amount from the sides. Whether this is something that needs to be taken into account when sorting shanks may be worth considering, because when the shank ends are trimmed after the hammers are installed, they aren't all necessarily shortened by the same amount.</BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE cite="" type="cite"> </BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE cite="" type="cite">The really tough question now is, what am I going to do with these things?</BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE cite="" type="cite"> </BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE cite="" type="cite">Albert (Bert) Picknell</BLOCKQUOTE> <BLOCKQUOTE cite="" type="cite">Head Piano
Technician</BLOCKQUOTE> <DIV>The Banff Centre<BR></DIV></BLOCKQUOTE></BLOCKQUOTE><BR><p> 
<p class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<tbody><tr>
<td style="padding: 0.75pt;">
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"><font face="Times New Roman" size="3"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">
<hr align="center" size="1" width="100%">
</span></font></div>
<p class="MsoNormal"><font face="Times New Roman" size="3"><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><img id="_x0000_i1026" src="http://us.i1.yimg.com/us.yimg.com/i/ca/iotg_search.jpg" align="absbottom" border="0" height="25" hspace="4" width="25"><a href="http://ca.toolbar.yahoo.com/" target="_new"><b><span style="font-weight: bold;" lang="NO-BOK">Yahoo!
Canada Toolbar :</span></b><span lang="NO-BOK"> Search from anywhere on
the web and bookmark your favourite sites. Download it now! </span></a>
</span></font><span lang="NO-BOK"><o:p></o:p></span></p>