Alistair I assumed other would reply right away, but since they didn't, I'll take jab at it. >From what I've been told, the Lester Piano Co. from Philadelphia, started making the Betsy Ross spinets right after WWII. Because the majority of pianos were to be sold on the East coast of America, where it's very humid, Lester aslo installed a damp chaser, right under the elbows. The actions, I believe, were made by Pratt Read. They had started making action parts like damper levers, flanges, wippens, back checks, and elbows, out of a new product called plastic. What Pratt Read the chemist who made the stuff didn't know, was that the plastic was made similar to an epoxy today, in that it contained a hardening agent. But what didn't know was that the hardening agent kept hardening, long after the plastic was hardened. It hardened even more when heat was added. Back to the Lester. They made tons of Betsy Ross spinets, all with a 10 year warrantee. About 3 or 4 years after the first BR spinet was sold, the plastic elbows started breaking. So the company had to pay to repair all those pianos. It wasn't long before they were spending more money repairing all those pianos, and as a result, along with a bad economy, the company finally went out of business in 1960. As I mentioned, Pratt Read sold many thousands of actions with plastic parts in them. For many technicians in the USA during the 70's and 80's replacing those plastic parts was a major source of income. Schaff made flanges and other parts to replace the plastic ones, but I've run across several actions where no wood replacement parts could be found. As I said, this is the what I've been told. There will probably be other techs who have a different take on all of this. Willem (Wim) Blees, RPT Piano Tuner/Technician 94-505 Kealakaa Str. Mililani, Oahu, HI 96789 808-349-2943 www.Bleespiano.com Author of: The Business of Piano Tuning available from Potter Press www.pianotuning.com 94-505 Kealakaa Str. Mililani, Oahu, HI 96789 808-349-2943 www.Bleespiano.com Author of: The Business of Piano Tuning available from Potter Press www.pianotuning.com -----Original Message----- From: David Lawson Pianos <dlawson at davidlawsonspianos.com.au> To: pianotech at ptg.org Sent: Tue, Dec 8, 2009 12:50 pm Subject: Re: [pianotech] Betsy Ross Spinet Thanks Bruce, I'm not certain about how to search the archives but I'll try & have a go! I guess I was just wondering if the later models of this piano had the problems with plastic parts that the earlier ones seemed to have & I had hoped that some of the USA techs might have had some advice regarding this. Regards, Alastair, David Lawson's Pianos Wangaratta Australia ----- Original Message ----- From: "Bruce Browning - The Piano Tuner" <justpianos at our.net.au> To: <pianotech at ptg.org> Sent: Tuesday, December 08, 2009 5:15 PM Subject: Re: [pianotech] Betsy Ross Spinet > Alistair, > Since you monitor the American PTG site this may be your best source of > information. Do you know how to search the archive? Much discussed over > the years. > Bruce Browning > The Piano Tuner. > > > >> We may be acquiring a Betsy Ross Spinet, made be Lester in the USA.The >> serial number is 329958, which should put it at about 1960 according to >> Pierce. >> We haven't come across many of these pianos here in Australia, so were >> wondering what we should look out for. Do these later models have plastic >> components that may cause problems, and if so, are the replacement parts >> readily available? > > > > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <http://ptg.org/pipermail/pianotech.php/attachments/20091208/27d01389/attachment-0001.htm>
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