New York or Hamburg

[Roger Jolly]

Greetings All,
               I'm just starting to rebuild a Steinway Model O Ser#189171
A date stamp was found on the rear of the under lever tray 2nd May 1918.
The plate and case was poorly refinished with the strings still on. The
pins & strings were beautifully painted, strings were so rusty measurement
is unreliable. Only after rubbing down the plate did I know for sure that
it was an O. Also a number of strings have been replaced in this  register
to add to the complicationsThe scaling is slightly different from the
Hamburg to the New York models. Now to the question, is the bridge and
plate geometry different? or was this done for an empirical reason?  Any
advice or confirmation of origin would be helpful and save me calculating
the 5 or 6 note differences. One clue that I do have that makes me suspect
that it's from Hamburg is the 18mm plate lag bolts.

  I will be rebushing the damper guides, they have a thin black woven inner
guide felt with a traditional red woven contact felt glued to it, the
person that I spoke to at Steinway thought I was from Mars. For those with
Steinway experience, two questions. Do you rebush with a heavy bushing
cloth to compensate, or where can I obtain the two correct thickness of felt?

 Final question if it's a Hamburg Steinway do you string SWG or metric?

Thanks in advance. Roger
Roger Jolly
Baldwin Yamaha Piano Centre
Saskatoon and Regina
Saskatchewan, Canada.
306-665-0213
Fax 652-0505