> Hi, > With all the discussion of seating the strings it seems that there is > never > much discussion of what over aggressive seating does to the sound. > Since I > do not know would someone please discribe the negative tonal effects? > Joe Goss RPT Well, we worked on a 7' Grotrian recently in which someone had seated the strings a little too aggressively. These strings were seated so aggressively that they were buried in the bridge. This is not a good thing (I assume that when I support string seating it's obvious that this isn't the desired result). Not only does this ruin the bridge/bridge cap - it changes the speaking length of the string and consequently introduces some tonal issues that aren't fixable without addressing the bridge. We planed down the bridge, re-notched it, and put on a set of new strings (along with some other action work). This is a perfect example of someone hearing that they should seat strings, and running out and trying it with their sledge hammer. This same piano had a delaminated pinblock due to pin setting without a jack underneath. This is where a list can be dangerous with "do this" or "don't do this" being thrown around. We get away from the holistic view of what we're trying to accomplish, and get too focused on the micro view of a particular aspect. Techs should try things like string seating - judiciously though. Try something like this on one note - does it make it better? If so, try more. It's not rocket science (and truth be told, even rocket science isn't that difficult). Just like voicing, or any other technique that is new to a technician - try it out judiciously, with the end result in mind. Experiment, though not too aggressively, and see if you make a change for the better or worse. Keep your end goal constantly in mind, and through experience you'll develop your own ideas about what works and what doesn't. In the end, our goal is to make pianos sound, and perform better Jonathan Finger RPT
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