polishing spoons

[John Formsma]

Hi Bill.

Likewise. Good to put a face to the name.  Sorry mine wasn't anything
better to look at, though. ;-)

I've never tried peeling off the damper felt, and it wouldn't be my
first thing to try. In the situation Dean listed, I would mention to
the customer that dampers need to be replaced. If problems develop as
a result of bad dampers, I wouldn't feel it my responsibilty to spend
hours trying to realign string grooves to strings.  The emery board
has worked pretty well for me on the flat felt.

Others have suggested using a battery-operated toothbrush, which
sounds fun to try. Sounds like it would do great on bichord and
monochord felts.

Setting dampers is not on my fun list of things to do either, but I
think it would be easier than spending hours trying to align those
string grooves. I don't have a lot of experience with that, though.
Just guessing mostly.

JF

On 6/28/07, William R. Monroe <pianotech at a440piano.net> wrote:
>
>
> Hi John,
>
> Nice meeting you at KC!
>
> I think peeling off would be trouble.  For starters, you'd have to go
> through and reset all the damper timing.  Unless of course you were lucky
> enough to have a piano in which all the dampers were lifting late, then it
> might solve two problems.  ;-]
>
> William R. Monroe
>
>
>
>
> You can "fluff up" the crusty damper felt with an emery board or something
> similar. I wouldn't leave any grooves in the damper felt before
> reinstallation -- otherwise, it would indeed take hours. Could you also peel
> off a layer of the flat felts if there were deep grooves?
>
> JF
>
>
> On 6/28/07, Dean May <deanmay at pianorebuilders.com> wrote:
> > I'll second that. I never touch a damper flange screw on worn dampers if
> > there are no problems. If you tighten them or take them off and reinstall,
> > the flange will likely move slightly and the grooves will no longer line
> up
> > with the strings. The result is ringing dampers that you can spend hours
> > fussing with trying to reseat the worn grooves.
> >
> >
> > Dean
> >
> > Dean May
> >
>
>