boring hammers

[Stéphane Collin]

Hi all.

Thanks to your usual good input, I was able today to do my best boring job
ever.  Ar, the job was not boring at all though.  The main key that I was
missing was that custom shape hammer holder that makes sure all the hammers
present the same way in the jig.  The second key I was missing, because it
is way too simple and evident for my poor tortured mind, was to make a try
on some dummy molding, see how to correct the setting of the jig.
Thank you Dale (I double checked the bedding), John (I read the valuable
input, and admired the machine), David, Fenton (might not be too scientific
(although...), but it works, and that is what I needed).

Richard, on this piano, I was able to experiment a bit with the old hammers
: the treble ones were still sounding great.  What I tried was to unglue
some hammers, enlarge a bit their hole, and reglue them so the crown was
still at the same strike point, but the rake was increased.  Among all
those, I found out very evidently that the one hammer that hits the strings
at perpendicular is the loudest one, by far enough to convince me that at
least in the treble, perpendicular strike is desirable in order to get all
the power possible.  I did conceive it makes sense before, but did not think
the effect in the real world would be so prominent.
I would like, another time, to do a similar test with hammers perpendicular
to strings at strike time, but with different bore distances, so the
variable would be the angle between the shank and the strings.  Again, I
believe that the maximum power would be when the shank is parallel to the
strings, but don't know how much difference it would be if there was an
angle, all other things being equal.

Thanks again.
Best regards.

Stéphane Collin.


 


For my part... I continue at present to make the hammer perpendicular to 
the shank at string impact.  Tho I am starting to take a closer look at 
what this results in in terms of offset angle to the string.  I may 
adjust my proceedure in the future if I see a good enough reason to do so.

Cheers
RicB