Rosewood tuning lever/hammer

[Isaac OLEG]

This is a multi-part message in MIME format.

---------------------- multipart/alternative attachment
Hi !

It Is for uprights pianos probably ; I used one, in fact the effort asked to
the arm is less grand because of the posture.
You have to take off the bottom board and stand really the most parallel you
can with the piano.

The feedback in the palm of the hand is absolutely less precise than the one
with the fingers, I've find too.
But it may be my favorite hammer for pitch raises or chip tunings, for speed
reason and less tiredness.
What makes it difficult to control is  the lack of good feeling when pushing
on the handle, but I never used a pear shaped or oblong one, only bowl
shapes.
I am persuaded a handle that is pear shaped but only slightly larger than
usual hammers may be good, one may be able to hold it with the fingers only
if necessary (the palm of the hand tend to put permanent pressure on the
lever, and in fact, the part of the fingers that push to hold the bawl is
not very sensitive, and the pal itself does not "hold" the bowl, it only lay
on it.

There is also something with the equilibrium that bother me a little. It
always seem appealing to all my colleagues, but none have find it really
very accurate, probably because the use of the palm of the hand.
Funny as we may use our fingers a lot without noticing eventually.

I am not to say it is not possible to use it of course, but it really seem
to forward less information.

I actually hold my Yamaha tuning lever with 3 fingers, more or less to be
far on the handle, the feedback is good enough (for fine or usual tuning
indeed, if I have to turn a lot a more standard posture is used)

On verticals the round shape allow to go fast from one tuning pin to the
other, with a balancing move of the key but the fit on the pin is not always
ideal then.

With a standard tuning lever (on verticals)  one have to learn to go very
fast around the tip of the lever with 3 fingers ( like when snapping the
fingers) and move the hammer while holding it that way. That avoid a lot of
neck and back problems (you have if you keep your ankle up while moving the
hammer) and you have always a good fit on the tuning pin. Idem, for
verticals, a 3 fingers holding at the top of the handle is well for me.

But I spend years and years holding my handle in a perfect parallel motion
before I understood that anyway the pin is twisting !

I consider that a firm holding is good up to some point, but at a certain
moment one have to produce so small changes in pin twist and pressure that
the firm holding is not accurate enough.
So whenever possible a holding that allow to tune up to the final little
moves is giving you some advantage.

Nowadays, definitively, if your playing hand does not tune also, only half
of the job is possible. I am persuaded that some pianists put some notes in
tune when working the piano (rehearsal for instance), they force the note
till the tone please them, eventually  and leave it where it is after that
(when possible).

As a note well tuned is stronger, they don't have to play is so strong after
that, they'll be amazed if you tell them what they do ! (some knows it of
course) same sexy idea that the pianist that knows when somebody else have
played his own piano, that something is different.

Best regards.

Isaac








-----Message d'origine-----
De : pianotech-bounces@ptg.org [mailto:pianotech-bounces@ptg.org]De la part
de Gevaert Pierre
Envoyé : samedi 21 août 2004 22:33
À : Pianotech
Objet : Re: Rosewood tuning lever/hammer


Hi,

I just used one of those ball type tuninglevers (from Jahn) on a grand and
it felt quite unconfortable to me. Maybe I should try a few more times to
get used to it and I suppose the technique is different than with a standard
tuninglever.
I've heared that it has more advantages when tuning uprights?
I use the rosewood lever from Schaff also but the Jahn looks more precise
and solid to me.

Greetings,

Pierre Gevaert
Belgium


  ----- Original Message -----
  From: Alpha88x@aol.com
  To: pianotech@ptg.org
  Sent: Saturday, August 21, 2004 2:16 AM
  Subject: Re: Rosewood tuning lever/hammer


  Greetings,

              I use a Rosewood hammer from Schaff. I like it. By the way,
what is the advantage of a hammer with a ball type lever?


  Julia Gottchall,
  Reading, PA

---------------------- multipart/alternative attachment
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: https://www.moypiano.com/ptg/pianotech.php/attachments/7b/66/a4/5f/attachment.htm

---------------------- multipart/alternative attachment--