[pianotech] Ampicophobia

[Stephen Grattan]

Hi Ed,

Any AMPICO I've worked on - the action just slides out.  At least you don't have 
a thru the keys Duo -Art!
 
Steve Grattan
Lost Chord Clinic




________________________________
From: Ed Foote <a440a at aol.com>
To: pianotech at ptg.org
Sent: Fri, February 22, 2013 10:07:52 AM
Subject: [pianotech] Ampicophobia

Greetings, 
Spiders. I hate spiders. Perhaps because our mother hated spiders, 
simultaneously shrieking and levitating in the kitchen, my brothers and I became 
adept at gauging the size of the menace by the pitch and altitude she 
accomplished. Roaches were more dangerous, as they caused her to be propelled 
sideways during the first three octave vocal glissando of her escape flight, but 
it is the arachnidan aspects of life that find their fear deep in my DNA, a 
boot-sector problem, if you will. 
       Wariness was warranted, growing up in the deep South, and anything that 
looked like a spider, or even evidence of a spider, was worthy of either a wide 
birth or a fast swat with the nearest blunt object. Even an obvious rubber one 
gets hit, just in case.
       It is the distant memory of being caught in cobwebs running through my 
head as I lay on my back under an otherwise innocent Knabe, pregnantly laden 
with an Ampico-A. The normal comforting underside view of a sound board obscured 
by a mesh of tubing and wires that could masquerade as a huge nest for a 
Woodstock-like gathering of large, black-legged spiders. 

       I would like to avoid this gnarl of pneumatic nightmares, but there is an 
action in need on the other side, waiting like a distressed damsel marooned on a 
river island, suffering the loss of its motion, crowded hammers, and weak 
jacks,. An easy save, were it not for this forest of tubes and couplings between 
us. 


In 34 years, I have learned not to be a hero. I have been beaten by a piano 
before. I have plunged into unknown territory amidst the sounds of snapping old 
maple and dusty felt tearing, only to emerge with mediocre results showing for 
the low, low, wages found at the bottom of a vertical learning curve. 

        I hesitate. I explain my reluctance to the apprehensive owner. I tell 
him that I will seek counsel regarding extracting his action and my paycheck 
before I do anything. So, august members with some familiarity of the Ampico-A, 
the question is, can I just slide this action out of the piano, or must I 
disconnect things airy and electric? 

Thanks, 

Ed Foote RPT
http://www.piano-tuners.org/edfoote/well_tempered_piano.html
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