Bechstein rebuild

[John Delacour]

At 10:19 -0500 18/4/08, Andrew Remillard wrote:

>So...anybody see something like this before? Did Bechstein use a 
>variety of action set ups thought the years? Even going retro as 
>late as the 1920's?

Yes, and not only Bechstein.  I only realized this last year when a 
colleague sent me the action from a Grotrian for repairs, saying it 
was from the 1920s.  It had a tied action made by a rather mediocre 
German action maker and I was sure it was from before 1905, because 
in 1905 Grotrian fitted a a very fine action with capstans that 
incorporated their own improved method of adjuecting the repetition.

In fact, when I came to see the whole piano, there was no doubt that 
it was from 1920s, and a month or so later I took in a Bechstein 
Model C, also from 1923, which has a tied action by Langer of the 
Schwander B type.

These things are often just a wuestion of fashion.  When I started in 
the trade almost all European makers including Bechstein and 
Bšsendorfer, as well as the Japanese, fitted the Schwander B type 
action with the long adjustable stpring and the loop on the jack, 
which Bechstein had used for 80 years.  Then suddenly within the 
space of a few years in the 1980s everybody had switched to the 
primitive Erard-Herz action as used on the Steinway.  Within another 
short time nearly every maker fitting duplex scaling to the grands.

JD