Steinway regulation

[Richard Brekne]

Hi there Kev...

Nice to be working on good pianos... I had a stint where I was working on
mostly new Samick grands... not quite the same thing but all new pianos is a
different situation then beat up whatever you run intos for sure. Now I am in a
completely different situation. 60 % of my income comes from my job at the UiB
where I care for about 50 instruments, 16 of them grands. Most of them in
reasonably good shape. The uprights however.... well Petrofs may sound ok...
but they sure cant handle a beating over time.

Anyways.... as to this thread and all these lines and uniformities.. One thing
I always do before starting a full regulation is to run a straight edge under
all the knuckles and look at the resulting hammer line. This tells me a bit
about just how much I can expect without dinking around with knuckles. Then I
run that same straight edge under the whippen cushions. If the resulting hammer
line is like all over the place then you have little chance of getting any real
uniformity without correcting the middle action first... course you could
always do some creative hammer filing...grin... but then you run into mass
uneveness and voicing challanges.

Next time you do an old beater check this out. Worn knuckles can cause a lot of
this kinda uneveness as I am sure you already know plenty about. But worn and /
or uneven whippen cushions can cause more problems then I think a lot of folks
give them credit for. I have gotten in the habit of alway looking at how even
the whippen cushions are after setting a first hammer line.... gives me a good
indication of what I can expect.

Grin.. I am looking forward to your Brambach story... have a nice weekend.

"Kevin E. Ramsey" wrote:

>     Perhaps it's obvious that I work on mainly new pianos. Working as a
> staff technician for a major dealership is a give & take thing, but working
> on new Yamaha's is one of the real perks. Still don't have the energy to
> write about that Brambach though. (Shudder)
>
> Kevin E. Ramsey
> ramsey@extremezone.com
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Richard Brekne" <Richard.Brekne@grieg.uib.no>
> To: <pianotech@ptg.org>
> Sent: Friday, March 23, 2001 1:27 AM
> Subject: Re: Steinway regulation
>
> >
> >
> > > >     No, how about uniform dip, uniform aftertouch, and an even hammer
> line?
> >
> > I understand the point, and I am sure Kevin is thinking in terms of
> "acceptable
> > divergence" in his own way like the rest of us. No doubt about it even on
> an old
> > action you can get all things pretty darn good if you first put out the
> effort.
> > But as in all things a bit of scrutiny, or shall we call it being
> picky.... will
> > always reveal something that could have been better, straighter, more
> uniform.
> >
> > Definantly the right thing to keep your sights on tho Kev.
> >
> > --
> > Richard Brekne
> > RPT, N.P.T.F.
> > Bergen, Norway
> > mailto:Richard.Brekne@grieg.uib.no
> >
> >

--
Richard Brekne
RPT, N.P.T.F.
Bergen, Norway
mailto:Richard.Brekne@grieg.uib.no