<!doctype html public "-//W3C//DTD W3 HTML//EN"> <html><head><style type="text/css"></style><title>Re: Scaling Problem reduex</title></head><body> <div>Kevin, Joe, Ron and other lurkers,</div> <div><br></div> <div>Saw your post earlier today Kevin when you wrote:</div> <div><br></div> <blockquote type="cite" cite><font face="Arial" size="-1"> I've noticed something on some newer pianos lately . . . I've been encountering more and more pianos of late that seem to have a real scaling problem in the low tenor section. . . but where I really see it is in the new Yamaha model GA1, and . . GH1. What is happening is that the designers of these pianos have put too many notes in the tenor that belong in the bass. As you play chromatically down the scale, these notes start sounding like "pong-pong-pong" and then you hit the bass, and they sound normal again.</font></blockquote> <div><br></div> <div>Your absolutely correct. Why oh why are so many manufacturers so 'thick' that they can't see that they're crippling their smaller pianos by insisting on breaking at B27. Little pianos like the GA1 should break at E32/F33 at the lowest, but they just don't get it.</div> <div><br></div> <blockquote type="cite" cite><font face="Arial" size="-1">    I know that this is caused by continuing to drop the tension on the strings in order to get the fundamental down to the required frequency, but you reach a certain point, and you get a tone that seems hollow and is very difficult to fit in with the rest of the tuning.</font></blockquote> <div><br></div> <div>As soon as the long bridge turns and heads for the bass side of the case the scale has had it. If the break was higher up the tension wouldn't fall away so dramatically.</div> <div><br></div> <blockquote type="cite" cite><font face="Arial" size="-1">    I've had some partial success with carefully doping the hammers, and voicing the bass down, plus leveling strings, straightening termination points etc., but not to any totally satisfactory result.</font></blockquote> <div><br></div> <div>No it's not possible to get it satisfactory. But why should technicians in the field have to go to such measures just to get the things to sound somewhat like a piano. And it's only half a fix anyhow, because the problem is with the scale.</div> <div><br></div> <div>Ron N's suggestion was sound, and I have no doubt that installing bichord covers for a few notes will make the piano 'less bad' as he says. But I'm more in favour of installing a tenor bridge and completely rescaling the thing. But you wouldn't bother with a little entry level piano like the GA1.</div> <div><br></div> <div>Kevin continued later in the day;</div> <div><br></div> <blockquote type="cite" cite><font face="Arial" size="-1">Thanks to all who have responded. . . . . . . . I have nothing but the greatest respect for Yamaha, and their products, (I own two) but I can't understand why that company, which is the most advanced in the world, could produce a product with such obvious poor planning.</font></blockquote> <div><br></div> <div>While Yamaha certainly know how to manufacture pianos to a blueprint, they get the blueprint wrong. They don't seem to have a clue about scale design with their smaller grands (ie, anything under and before the C7F), and there's not a Japanese manufacturer with a decent upright scale. Furthermore, both the Yamaha CF and Kawai's EX are basically scaling clones of the Steinway D (all three have got a speaking length at F21 of 183 cm - what a magic number this must be!). Why? Why do this? What's so wrong with doing a bit of original thinking. We've all basically wasted a whole century by trying to follow in the foot steps of one company. Why do this? We homo sapiens are supposed to be intelligent, but sometimes we seem to be no more creative than sheep.</div> <div><br></div> <blockquote type="cite" cite><font face="Arial" size="-1">The Japanese are such industrious and intelligent people, that you would think that surely they would stop and go back to the drawing-board before shipping one.</font></blockquote> <div><br></div> <div>There are intelligent folks and idiots amongst all nationalities. We just need to believe in ourselves now and then. We can move forward if we let ourselves do it. It's no use going back to the 'drawing board' only to produce the same old trash. We need to rethink the parameters, and it needs to happen in our generation. Actually, I believe this list just might make it possible. Isn't that an exciting prospect.</div> <div><br></div> <blockquote type="cite" cite><font face="Arial" size="-1">    If I tuned nothing but Yamaha grands, I could spend out my days in relative happiness.</font></blockquote> <div><br></div> <div>I couldn't. They're fine while ever the wether stays stable. But as soon as the wether changes the tuning stability is 'out the window', and its scale and down bearing and sound board related.</div> <div><br></div> <blockquote type="cite" cite><font face="Arial" size="-1">But I just don't get it with these really small ones that are starting to come out on the market.</font></blockquote> <div><br></div> <div>Many designers seem to be such 'traditionaloids', they can't bring themselves to move the break away from A#26/B27. That's where it's always been historically - so we can't mess with tradition can we? It's a similar situation with 7' grands which break at E20/F21. Just because the concert piano breaks at F21, why should the 7' scale be ruined by breaking it at F21. A 145 cm F21 speaking length on the 7' is going to be somewhat short on break % compared to the 183 cm F21 on the concert piano (and there's a 'paddock full' of these ordinary 7' pianos out there, which could be so much better at no extra cost). Let's damn tradition, if there's a better way of designing than the traditional way.</div> <div><br></div> <blockquote type="cite" cite><font face="Arial" size="-1">    But I'm not working to please myself. I just don't want a customer to buy one, and then think that it's a tuning issue, like I should be able to just fix it in three to five minutes. I'm a "technician"  not a  "magician".</font></blockquote> <div><br></div> <div>Exactly, but you'd need to be a magician to get many of those stupid little designs to hold tune for longer than takes for you to get your kit back in the car - if indeed you were able to get it into tune at all. I had an experience some years ago when I got a call-back to a newish Japanese 131 cm top of the range vertical I'd tuned the week before. "It's gone out of tune", she bleated over the phone. When I checked the piano, it was the fallen-over tension area just before the cross which had gone quite sharp (it had rained during the week since the tuning hadn't it!). When I tried to explain that the problem was with the scale design of the piano, the client didn't believe me. She accused me of incompetence and of trying to pass the blame onto the piano - which couldn't be the problem, after all, it was a new piano! I was less than impressed with the prospect of wearing the blame for something which I knew to be due to poor scale design.</div> <div><br></div> <div>There, I feel a whole lot better now. I've been quietly bubbling over for a while on this issue. Thanks Kevin.</div> <div><br></div> <div>We must widen our design perspective. It is now possible to design and build pianos which are better than anything which has gone before. Let's do it! Even the cheaper pianos could still have better design.</div> <div><br></div> <div>Over and out.</div> <div><br></div> <div>Ron O</div> <div>-- <br> ______________________________<br> <br> Website:  http://www.overspianos.com.au<br> Email:        mailto:ron@overspianos.com.au<br> ______________________________</div> </body> </html>