CP 60-70-80's

[Ron Nossaman]

> I'm starting a project soon with an unrepentant rock and roller who 
> swears that nothing better than the CP-70 was ever invented for his kind 
> of music. I had to deal with his Kawai EP 308M recently and was really 
> put off by the little rubber cup-like items that the key bottoms 
> squashed into on the way to activating the MIDI contacts. Oh, well.....
> 
> I'm asking if anybody on the list has ever experimented with replacing 
> the hard plastic insert that forms the tip of the hammer with any other 
> material that might allow something like ordinary voicing capabilities. 
> I had to pull one hammer and shank off a CP-70 in order to repin the 
> flange and, like its Kawai counterpart, it had a plastic piece forming 
> the "pointy end" of the hammer, with buckskin over top of it.
> 
> It's really "creepy" to have a supposed piano hammer that is not really 
> a piano hammer.......
> 
> Robin Blankenship

It's a rubber-like stuff underneath, not hard, but firm and 
resilient. Big wedges of red stuff in the bass and tenor, and 
thin black wrap arounds in the treble. I think that might be 
Ecsaine on top instead of buckskin, but I'm not entirely sure. 
The replacements I'll be making are in the treble, and will 
have the under layer of PVCE soaked Ecsaine, with Ecsaine 
covering.

I won't get the chance on this one, but it would be 
interesting to see if real hammers would work on these things.
Ron N