wood, wax and mold

[J Patrick Draine]

"Carol R. Beigel" wrote:

> .
>
> Patrick - I will concede that before I became a piano technician, that
> everything I learned about mold, mildew and other assorted furry growths
> came from my refrigerator, but I was referring to a specific lecture given
> at a convention.  I believe this was presented by a piano manufacturer that
> had used a microscope and was showing slides of a felt bushing that had been
> treated for vertigris.  The slides showed severe damage to the wool.  The
> gist of the lecture was 1) vertigris was a mold, 2) that even if you killed
> it, it still came back, 3) it attacked the parafin used in the wool bushing.
>

Let's start with the spelling: verdigris. At least that's what my Webster's
tells me (no alternate spellings listed, but it's an abridged dictionary).

Can we identify the manufacturer-lecturer? I would guess that it was not the
"prime suspect", S&S, but more likely Willis & David Snyder. I do recall their
classes in which they dealt with the problems of verdigris, and they had a
number of high magnification slides which illustrated  verdigris contamination.
Maybe I stepped out of the room for a minute, or nodded off for a few seconds,
but I don't recall mold being invoked as the culprit.

I think it's much more likely that it's a chemical reaction. While my earlier
citation of Webster's was regarding spelling, they do list a definition. Said
defintion may be "hearsay evidence"  (dictionary editors are not chemists) but
here it is "1. a green or greenish-blue poisonous compound prepared by treating
copper with acetic acid, used as a medicine, pigment, and dye. 2. a green or
greenish-blue coating that forms like rust on brass, bronze, or copper."

I would suggest that it is a reaction between the acids used (and not
thoroughly rinsed out) in the felt cloth processing, and the paraffin, which is
the substance you were focussing on (and maybe the wood too).

If it wasn't the Snyders' class you're referring to, I would guess that it was
a rep from the felt manufacturer, Charles House (sp?). Again, I've attended
their class and don't recall the invocation of molds.


At any rate, does anyone out there recall what piano authority claimed (or
proved for all I know) that verdigris=mold?

>
> .. and Patrick, since aeronautical engineers cannot, can you prove that
> bumblee bees fly?  :)

Nope, but plant biologists *can* identify many molds.


Yeah, I know. Picky, picky, picky ... (but that's why I'm a piano technician).


Patrick