Cantilever bridges and speaking lengths

[Delwin D Fandrich]

Your questions go well beyond what can be answered in a simple post to
pianotech. At least some of them, however, have been dealt with in my
various articles in the Piano Technicians Journal.

Del


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Calin Tantareanu" <dnu@fx.ro>
To: <pianotech@ptg.org>
Sent: November 23, 2003 12:12 PM
Subject: Cantilever bridges and speaking lengths


> Hello!
>
> While looking at some pretty big old pianos (parallel strung) which had
> cantilever bass bridges, although they had quite long speaking lengths, I
> was wondering how do these features influence the piano's sound? Now I
did
> read the messages here lately, saying that many of you choose to remove
> cantilevers and shorten the speaking lengths.
> But provided that:
> 1. The cantilever isn't excessively long (let's say no more than 10 cm)
so
> it's stiff enough and doesn't flex;
> 2. The backscale is sufficient (what is the smallest length recommendable
> for the backscale of A0?);
> Then, why wouldn't the cantilever make sense for moving the bridge
footprint
> to a more flexible area of the board and thereby have longer speaking
> lengths?
> In other words, is the gain in speaking length worth loosing [whatever
you
> loose through a cantilever bridge]? Up to what size, if any, is this a
good
> trade-off?
>
> Now, I know that a floating board could solve this problem, but still,
it's
> interesting to know if there are any other inherent flaws of cantilever
> bridges which I can't see so far.
> I have a Steinway O, under repairs right now, which has a cantilever bass
> bridge and a pretty short backscale on A0, yet it has a very deep tone in
> the bass. The board also seems to be quite flexible down there, if you
knock
> on the bass bridge (strings are currently off) it produces a low
frequency.
>
> So, what factors do influence the tone of the low bass and how?
>
> Regards,
>
>  Calin Tantareanu
> ----------------------------------------------------
>  e-mail: dnu@fx.ro
>  http://calintantareanu.tripod.com
> ----------------------------------------------------
>
>
>
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