Old plastic action parts

[John Ross]

Hi Stacy,
I just replaced all the p;astic parts with wood in a similar vintage
Heintzman,
last month.
I replaced the jacks w/o flanges, the backchecks, the hammer and wippen
flanges and the
damper flanges. I used the parts from Schaff #3791, 530X , 511C and 3717W.
Pianophile did not have the jacks w/o flanges. By using Schaff I was able to
pass
a saving on to the customer.
There was no problem with regulation, after the exchange of parts.
If you don't have a set of Don Manino's reamers, now is the time, because it
is
a lot of centre pins to replace.
It did take quite a lot of time, but the customer was happy with the bill.
Be sure to
demonstrate all the work involved. The hammer butt flanges were actually ok,
but
it didn't make sense not to change them, when everything was apart.
Regards,
John M. Ross
Windsor, Nova Scotia, Canada
piano.tech@ns.sympatico.ca
----- Original Message -----
From: "Stacy Adams" <adams_piano@hotmail.com>
To: <pianotech@ptg.org>
Sent: Friday, September 21, 2001 12:27 AM
Subject: Old plastic action parts


>
> List,
>
> I inspected an older (50s or 60s) Heinzman console today, the piano was to
> be evaluated for consigment at the store I work at.  The piano was in
> absolutely great shape, good board, bridges nearly perfect, nice finish
> even...but the action had plastic flanges and jacks.  The jacks were so
> brittle that I would just have to press lightly on the side of one and it
> would snap off at the centre pin.  I wonder if it would be possible to
find
> a similar wooden jack, and also replace the flanges?  Has anyone ever
> attempted anything like this?  I would expect that even if this were
> possible it probably wouldn't be cost effective given the amount of labor
> involved.
>
> Any comments?
>
> Stacy Adams
> Victoria, BC
>
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