Billings flanges newly installed on a upright hammer rail look like a picket fence built by a drunk! ANY relationship to straight and level is purely co-incidental! To begin with, I'll a mention couple of things NOT to do. First, don't bend the flange with a pair of parrallel pliers grasping the ends of the center pin. It works, but if the pin is too short, it does one or both of the following: 1. It ovals the pin bushing, and/or 2. it dents the inside of the flange mortise by pressing the flange into the wood! This can cause jerky movement of the butt. Second, don't install the butt without any adjustment of the flange. Most of them are just not usable that way! When I started, I was straightening the flange by swinging it so it was next to the butt felt, then grasping the upper (pin end) of the flange with a pair of needle-nosed pliers inserted into the mortise so that the jaws straddled the pin. Next, take your parrallel pliers and twist the lower end of the flange to be perpindicular to the side of the butt. You may have to take it out of the pliers several times until it looks straight (It won't be, but you've got to start somewhere!). Now, take a straight hammer shank (I'm assuming everybody knows how to find one. If not, ask me later) press fit it into the the butt without glue to be your direction pointer, and screw the butt to the rail. I use a machinists' compass square sitting on the damper rail to set the butt vertically in place. The butt should move to and fro without binding or moving away from the square. Do the rest of the section likewise. Re-install the hammer rail (from which you have removed the rest felt) and adjust the hangers so that the rail is level on the four action frame support ledges (which have no regulation felts). Press masking tape along the top edge of the rail just under the shanks then put a mark on the tape indicating one side of the shank. Push the rail toward the strings as far as it will go and mark the new position of the shank (if any) with a different colored pen (I use black first, then red). For any that have moved, draw an arrow pointing back toward the original mark (from the red toward the black). This is the direction to twist the flange to correct the traveling. Remove the shank from the butt. Pull the butt toward you and down as far as it will go so that you can insert the needlenoses as you did before to twist the pin end of the flange in the direction of the arrow on your tape. Arrow pointing to your right, twist clockwise or the reverse for left arrow. You should have marked the shanks' position in the butt so you'll keep everything the same. Put the shank back in the butt and reswing the rail to see if you accomplished anything. You will find your shank is lined up with the red mark now and will slide along it as you push the rail! This means the shank is traveling straight. There is a training time here learning how far to twist to eliminate various amounts of travel. I sure am glad I have some fat in this job, because it's certainly going to take a while! After everything is swinging together square to the strings, reinstall your guide hammers, line their string marks up with the strings and start hanging hammers. If any of you people out there in "Tec-land" have any ideas how I might do this quicker or better, I surely would like to hear about it! Warren -- Warren D. Fisher fish@communique.net Registered Piano Technician Piano Technicians Guild New Orleans Chapter 701
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