The Soundboard bit.. was Steinways / David Andersen

[RicB]

Hi Terry...

You are right about the flat ribs in Steinway.  Tho I am less sure about 
curved ribs from Yamaha.  To quote John Patton from a correspondance 
from 3 years ago.

As for whether or not the end result difference between using curved vs 
flat ribs for equal degrees of compression result in a board less or 
more likely to develope a killer octave is concerned.  I have no idea 
myself.  I do know however that Steinway is not alone in using CC boards 
with flat ribs.

Cheers
RicB

">/ Hi Richard.
/>/
/>/ ..........The ribs are flat  and pressed into a curved caul.  However, the /panel is /dried to 5.5%.  Hope// that clears it up.
/>/
/>/ Best regards, John"/


    I think one of the big differences between the design/manufacture of a
    Yamaha soundboard vs. a S&S soundboard is that the S&S utilizes flat
    ribs,
    whereas - I think - I'm pretty sure - but I could be wrong - Yamaha
    uses
    curved ribs cut to some radius. I think most other manufacturers
    also use
    curved ribs - but I am definitely not up on who uses what. Are there
    any
    other manufacturers that use flat ribs?

    I believe that a soundboard built with curved ribs will tend to
    maintain
    some crown even after significant compression set has occurred in
    the panel,
    whereas the flat-ribbed soundboard has only the panel to support any
    crown -
    once the panel gets squarshed enough, the thing goes flat.

    So I guess you could call a S&S board a pure compression-crowned
    soundboard
    and something like a Yamaha soundboard (if, of course, I am correct
    about
    their general soundboard manufacturing methods) as having
    compression and
    rib supported crown.

    Terry Farrell