[pianotech] Plastic Flange Replacement

[Susan Kline]

Dean's advice sounds very good. If you get them even roughly in order,
you'll have far less bending to do. New damper felt is easy, and will
seat better since it won't have any dents from prior use to try to get
back in place. For the bass section, new wedges premade are better yet.
You can install the levers in as good order as you can, bend the wires
so the heads line up and seem in the right places, and then put glue on
the wedges, and slide them down the strings to glue to the heads.
Alignment perfect.

I've replaced parts where both the flanges and the levers were plastic.
Bending wires from scratch was hard and time-consuming. Having them
roughly right before you start would save a lot of time.

Glad you're saving the piano. It's not like all the other parts were
bad. Even so, I've saved some otherwise nice small pianos with almost all
plastic parts -- but I never did manage to do it without thinking
afterward that I'd underbid.

Susan

Dean May wrote:
> use your digital calipers to measure the length of the damper heads and you
> should be able to get them back in order. I suspect you will still need to
> change the felts, they are not going to mate to the strings exactly. 
>
> Dean
> Dean W May                (812) 235-5272 voice and text 
> PianoRebuilders.com    (888) DEAN-MAY        
> Terre Haute IN 47802
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: pianotech-bounces at ptg.org [mailto:pianotech-bounces at ptg.org] On Behalf
> Of Terry Farrell
> Sent: Tuesday, February 12, 2013 3:09 PM
> To: pianotech at ptg.org
> Subject: [pianotech] Plastic Flange Replacement
>
> I have a client with a 1950's Estey console with plastic flanges on the
> damper levers that are crumbling to pieces. No plastic flanges anywhere else
> on piano. The piano is in good to even very good condition for its age -
> regulation is even pretty good. Client want to fix the piano if the cost is
> not too high.
>
> I've run across crumbling plastic flanges numerous times in the past, but
> the client has always chosen to junk the piano rather than do the repair.
> However, in this case with the piano being in good shape otherwise, I think
> choosing to do the repair is reasonable. This would be my first plastic
> flange replacement job.
>
> Looking for advice. In this particular case, most of the dampers have fallen
> to the bottom of the piano. There will be no definitive way to know which
> damper belongs to exactly which note. The damper felt is in good condtion -
> the few dampers that work quiet the strings nicely and do not buzz.
>
> I suspect that after new flanges are installed on the levers and the lever
> assemblies installed on the rail, there will be a pretty fair bit of wire
> bending to be done because of the new flanges and levers being in new
> positions. I am further thinking that even though the damper felt is still
> "good", it is also 60 + years old and only if one is very lucky will any of
> the dampers dampen the strings very well. So I'm thinking that some wire
> bending (much less than if the old damper felt were to be used) and new
> damper felt is in order.
>
> Or am I missing some quick & efficient way to use the original damper felt
> successfully and not spend a day bending damper wires?
>
> Thanks!!!
>
> Terry Farrell
>
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