<!doctype html public "-//w3c//dtd html 4.0 transitional//en"> <html> <body text="#000000" bgcolor="#FFFFFF" link="#0000EE" vlink="#551A8B" alink="#FF0000">   Antares wrote: <blockquote TYPE=CITE>Hey but this is a very interesting remark! Maybe that is the key answer to our debate. I must confess that I have no experience at all with New York Steinways, except one time, when me and my wife visited musician friends in NY. (I do know however soem older NY Steinways here in Europe, but they are old, and quite different from the modern version) One of the friends had bought a Steinway grand and she asked me would I please remove a pencil she had dropped in the action. Me being a jolly and generous guy (;>() I opened up the instrument, pulled out the action, removed the pencil and was startled by what I saw. First I thought somebody had fooled her. Although I could tell from the principle parts like the tubular frame etc that this was a Steinway, I did not recognize it from the way I knew the Hamburg Steinways. Later I got some more specific info about the differences between the Hamburg and the New York Steinways and I now understand better why there is a difference. First of all the market is different and the prices are much lower, secondly there is of course a big difference between the USA and Europe and emotions could flare up easily over which instrument is better. At the last Frankfurter Messe I talked to a Hamburg representative and he told me that he liked the New York bass better than the Hamburg one and the Hamburg treble better than the NY one. Isn't that a nice statement? ? Anyway, indeed I have never actually worked on an American Steinway and my professional opinion is based only on the Hamburg type. Same with the hammers, the voicing, or the felt in general. That fact alone has already caused some "discussions" and I now understand better why and how differences between different cultures could cause certain confusions. And indeed, at the Hamburg factory they were RATHER precise in the use or the applying of their own specifics, especially at the regulation and damper department (not to mention the gruelling weeks at the voicing dept. on the top floor). At Yamaha however they were indeed even more precise and extremely dedicated and disciplined, hence, of course, my conscience and sympathy for precision, and the use of every detail available. To give you one example (if I may?) At one time at the Yamaha Academy they showed a diagram of the hammer movement and they gave a very precise and detailed "tour" of the hammer blow distance, the let off, the drop, and finally the mysterious aftertouch. Actually, they already mentioned there and then the eventual deviations in measurements : for the hammer blow distance they told the students that a hammer blow should always be between 46 mm and 48 mm but no less, and no more than that. The let off was 2,5 mm - 2 mm -1,5 mm precise (this was the first year, the "basic grand piano course") the drop 2 mm and the aftertouch  >> no more << than 0,4 mm. They even gave the option of the "soft landing" or the "hard landing".. i.e. much aftertouch or very little aftertouch. For that reason they always checked the touch afterwards and, to make an even feel all over the keyboard and went back many times to adjust hammer blow distance and drop. (this was "only" the beginners basic course...wet your whistles for the last one! and/or spend some days with Damper-san from the concert grand dept... yo will learn to love your very specific measurements! and your steel nerves, which you need most urgently) Anyway, what I am trying to explain here is that I agree that most certainly there are several possibilities within the same "frame" but that these have been described already in detail in several different factory manuals. Time for another capucino..... Antares    </blockquote> Yes yes yes.. But my dear freind Antares. We are not talking about a new or almost new high quality piano, we are not talking about factory regulating, or regulating just prior to delivery to the customer, nor are we talking about regulating a piano that the regulator knows from experience fits specs. We are talking about a 35 year old Steinway L with god know what wear and tear and tinkering have gone on since it was last touched. If you set a Yamaha hammer to string distance to the specs you site above knowing that there is at least 3 mm of felt missing due to wear and reshapeing, well you are going to have one heck of an aftertouch sensation unless you compensate somewhere. And if you compensate ... well hey.. there goes that spec out the window. At the design and assembly stage, great... spec your heart out. But a few years down the line be ready to start flying by the seat of your pants. Or have the luxery of working on instruments that are in great shape to begin with. And even then.. pray you dont run into that kind of customer that just doesnt like the feel of the factory settings. We's-a not-a living in-a to-a dimensionale world-a. Richard Brekne Sydneskleiven 1 5010 Bergen, Norway <a href="richardb@c2i.net">E-mail Richard Brekne</a> <a href="http://home.c2i.net/ric/RicMain.html">Richard Brekne Website</a>   </body> </html>