Hi all,
First off, FOAM. It's rubbery, not stiff, ............... grey, convoluted
(egg carton on one side) and comes in various thicknesses. I get mine
locally from a foam supplier. I make a template of the areas betwixt the
backposts and take the patterns to the foam guy. He then cuts the stuff
with a slick little electric reciprocating finger slicing foot long razor
blade and I go back to the customer's house and install the stuff. I don't
fit the foam very tightly around the pedal solenoid (on grands) and I allow
air movement somewhere for the power supply to breathe. The fire problem
that was a major concern with one company recently, I think was a result of
foam being installed improperly, and the power supply being left on day and
night. Also, there's a possibility that foam might have been used around
the transformer itself. This was a suggestion from the factory on an old
model (using wet suit foam, very dense and thin) power supply to eliminate
transformer hum. I mounted all my power supplies at the time on leather
pads and found the results to be the same .................. it got rid of
the hum complaint. Wrapping the transformer tightly with none breathing wet
suit material could really trap a lot of heat. Long story
short,............ on verticals, fill the backpost cavities with convoluted
acoustic foam. It's good stuff. On grands, fill the underside with
convoluted acoustic foam, leaving room for the pedal solenoid (about a
finger's thickness) and some air gap somewhere for the power supply to
breathe. Usually the area around the pedal solenoid is enough for the power
supply to breathe. If the piano has really hard hammers, soften them
slightly with alcohol and water ............ a very thin bead from a hypo
bottle right on the strike surface .......... repeat to taste. The foam in
no way affects the way the hammer strikes the strings, so there's no voice
change, or tone change, just volume.
Disklavier vs. Concertmaster.
Disklavier is factory installed ............... in Yamahas only. Hmmmm
that means that all the techs that really know that product from the nuts
and bolts on out are in Japan somewhere huh?? Fortunately it functions very
well, needs very little service (so far) and performs like a virtuoso. As
for it's on board self diagnostic software ............ nice touch, over
engineered in my opinion. All the organs that I serviced years ago that had
this feature on them, never had the specific problem that I was called to
fix built into the software. There are a precious few things in the self
diagnostic that I see as being useful for the field tech, the rest is
either eyewash or for product engineers only.
Disklaviers play PianoSoft disks and any standard MIDI file type zero.
Concermaster plays anybody's disks, PianoSoft, Pianomation, PianoDisc, MIDI
file type zero, Pianomation CD's, as well as being equipt with a HUGE hard
drive that has ............. oh I dunno fer sure, but somewhere around a
weeks worth of music on board ........... all standard equipment. You can
also record onto the harddrive if you wish. It therefore has an onboard
floppy drive as well as an onboard CD player and harddrive, all in one
control box.
Students could also make MIDI files (type zero) on their computers and play
them back on either units. Computers don't read ESEQ format very well.
That's the format that DKV's record in. I'm not sure what format
Concertmaster records in but I would expect it to be a MIDI format.
As far as the recording aspects of the two, Yamaha DKV wins. So record on
the DKV and playback on either. Concertmaster has recently addressed the
record sensitivity of it's units and has improved them through an upgrade.
Speaking of upgrades, with the Concertmaster, it's as easy as inserting a
floppy in the floppy drive and pressing a few buttons. With the DKV, you
have to have some chip swapping knowledge, as well as the time to remove and
open the control box. I find this proceedure rather basic, however, not all
of you have been playing with electronics since before silicon was discovered.
As far as service support goes, they both have a very helpful staff that's
willing to talk with any qualified technician for as long as it takes to get
the job done. A word of caution, when talking to Yamaha, drink lots of
coffee before talking with Mark. He can talk faster than I can think.
BythewayHIMARK!! How'veyabeenanyway,haven'tspokewithyouferquiteaspellnow!!
Yamaha is 88 note, Concertmaster is 80 note playback.
Basically the Concertmaster is a QRS Pianomation solenoid set with a bunch
of Baldwin specific electronics attached to it.
You need to remove the control box on both of these products to access the
piano action. A REAL PAIN IF YOU'RE IN A HURRY. Don't drop a pencil inside
these things. ( grands only)
On playback, the DKV activates both the sostenuto pedal as well as the
sustain pedal. The Concertmaster only activates the sustain pedal. The
DKV's pedals actually move during playback where the Concertmaster pedal
doesn't move on playback. DKV's have incremental pedaling (half pedaling
and such) Concertmaster is simply ON or OFF.
Both pianos are fully functional as normal pianos without moving any levers
or pushing any buttons. As long as the player units aren't playing
anything, they will function to normal and customary factory specs, as
regular pianos.
At present, all Concertmaster pianos are factory installed that I know of.
They all have arrived here in good shape and play very well. Concertmaster
pianos are found in Baldwin products only. Being a typical QRS Pianomation
device primarily, you'll need the test and alignment box from QRS or Baldwin
to perform any minimum velocity changes, or sustain pedal "strike and hold"
adjustments. With DKV, this is done automatically through onboard software.
Avery, you mentioned an MX100. Unplug this unit if you're prone to dropping
your mutes inside pianos while tuning. If the handles short out the right
stuff down there, you're in for a heck of a repair bill from Yamaha
exchanging the power supply. Also, Yamaha has a modification available for
the MX100 (not to be confused with the MX100B) that will greatly improve the
record (I think), playback and soft play capability of the instrument. It
takes about an hour to install, and is available from the nice friendly
(fast talking) folks at Yamaha for a price that I'll let them disclose.
Look for the "choke handle" on the bass end of the underside of the keybed.
If you don't have one there, that's one MOD that you should consider
installing. The other is a ROM change. Check software for the ROM version
then call Yamaha for details.
Yamaha DKV's seem to have this loyal following that can be quite persistant
and downright irritating at times. It's reminiscent of the Fords vs. Chevys
vs. Mopar arguements I'd hear the "greasers" argue about during study hall
and homeroom in high school. Consider the source, remove the flap, absorb
the real content ......... if any. Besides, I prefer antique farm engines
and steam tractors.
Finally, relying on dealers to educate you on these products is like asking
Kinko the whale to give you directions to the green house on Beaker Street.
Lotsa opinions, lotsa experts, damn few facts. I strongly suggest you
persue the source, the factory, for infomation. They can send you brochures
that have all the specifications.
Feel free to email me Avery if you have any additional traffic on these
units. I enjoy the review. It keeps me up on stuff.
Larry Fisher RPT
specialist in players, retrofits, and other complicated stuff
phone 360-256-2999 or email larryf@pacifier.com
http://www.pacifier.com/~larryf/ (revised 10/96)
Beau Dahnker pianos work best under water
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