<!doctype html public "-//w3c//dtd html 4.0 transitional//en"> <html> John Delacour wrote: <blockquote TYPE=CITE>  You still seem to be regarding the bridge as an impediment to the lengthwise waves.  My view of these waves is that they travel along the wire itself and will no more be affected by areas of contact or shallow bends than the light waves passing along an optical fibre. Overhead power cables sing when current is passing through them and when a telegraph wire is carrying a phone converstation, it whistles. I'm not saying there's an analogy here, but there could well be. JD</blockquote> Taken from the Conklin article you refer to below is the following quote, which he basically says two or three times over in the case on non wound strings. It seems to me that Conklins statement is in conflict with your own about the termination points having no effect on the horizontal mode JD. Otherwise how can Conklins statement that it is the length of the speaking length that determines the frequency of the longitudinals ? <blockquote>"A piano tuner tunes the transverse, or flexural, modes of the strings by changing the tension of the strings as he turns the tuning pins. A piano tuner can do nothing to affect the frequency of the longitudinal mode because turning the tuning pins doesn't change it. The longitudinal frequency of a plain steel string in a piano can be changed only by altering its speaking length" PS. Conklin's lectures are at <<a href="http://www.speech.kth.se/music/5_lectures">http://www.speech.kth.se/music/5_lectures</a>>.  They go more deeply into the matter but not all that deep.</blockquote> I also seem to remember that Rons reading of the other Conklin article is also correct, having read that myself a couple times a year ago. I have it at the University and will check this again. But I dont think I remember it ever being stated that Longitudinal modes are uneffected by the terminations. But we will see.   -- Richard Brekne RPT, N.P.T.F. Bergen, Norway <A HREF="mailto:rbrekne@broadpark.no">mailto:rbrekne@broadpark.no</A>  </html>