---------------------- multipart/alternative attachment Hi Ron O I have a (1950s I think) 6ft Sohmer I posted about earlier that has brass bridge aggraffes in the tenor and first capo section but not in the bass. Since Phil Ford was in the shop the other day we looked at the bottom of it and it has a what looks like a 1/4" maple piece running under the bridge on the bottom of the board. He said it might be there to keep the bridge from rolling backwards because of the way the pressures are applied to the bridge. In this config. the strings come thru the agraffe and then up over a sligthly rounded hump then on to the hitch. This piano has a reverse crown board as well & sings like a soprano. In a previous Sohmer (also with reverse crown) I rebuilt ,the aggraffes screwed into the bridge with very fine machine threads. Can you imagine how time consumning that was. Well at least possible if they was turned into the bridge with a drill etc. My point is they were still solid in the bridge and worked well after 70 yrs. Why wouldn't this system be a candidate for some one like you? Dale Erwin Alternatively, one could build a panel with another bridge under the sound board as Grotrian did with some of their early grand pianos, but this would push the cost of the piano up quite a bit. The second concern I have with using bridge agraffes is fixing them permanently to the bridge. Of the bridge agraffed pianos I have heard, I suspect that this can be a problem. It may be possible to achieve a good connection by using West system glue between the agraffe and the bridge, and using machine screws to secure the agraffe to the bridge, while at the same time gluing them into the bridge with West system. Stephen Paulello's agraffes are glued to the bridge. Take a look again at the following close-up image of his agraffe. A light blue adhesive can be seen at the junction of the agraffe with the bridge. http://www.overspianos.com.au/plello1.jpg Notice also that its quite a good design since it has a low height from the bridge to the string plane. Unfortunately, this design could not be used for trichord stringing. Ron O. ---------------------- multipart/alternative attachment An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: https://www.moypiano.com/ptg/pianotech.php/attachments/e5/45/b4/fd/attachment.htm ---------------------- multipart/alternative attachment--
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