personal discovery

[Jon Page]

At 04:30 PM 03/05/2001 -0800, you wrote:
>List,
>
>So I'm here in the shop finishing up a Steinway M.  I noticed a wobbly 
>damper lever (dampers already rough regulated).  I put it off until 
>finally I decided I couldn't leave it.  I pulled the dampers and the 
>underlever system to  fix the problem.  Pinning was loose so I popped off 
>the lever/flange and repinned and then reglued and clamped.  I looked at 
>back at the piano and thought..."Hey this would be a good time to finish 
>up the let-off!"  So I installed the action and found I was able to align 
>the hammers, do let-off/drop, level strings and whatever I can think 
>of.   WOW!  This is the way to do it if your rebuilding a 
>grand.  Restring, hang your hammers rebuild action, whatever and then 
>regulate the action with the dampers out of the way.  Install your dampers 
>at the end of the job...this is probably common knowledge to everyone 
>except me (and I've thought of it but never actually did it)but if anyone 
>hasn't tried this give it a shot!
>
>David Ilvedson, RPT
>

The next step would be to replace the underlevers with the Renner USA 
Underlever Kit.

The biggest advantage is replacing those old stiff tabs with the spring 
mechanism. Also
the ability to install assist springs, not all pianos had them.

Regards,
Jon Page,   piano technician
Harwich Port, Cape Cod, Mass.
mailto:jonpage@mediaone.net
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