<!doctype html public "-//W3C//DTD W3 HTML//EN"> <html><head><style type="text/css"></style><title>Re: Mother goose string leveler</title></head><body> <div><font color="#000000">At 10:13 PM -0400 9/12/05, Erwinspiano@aol.com wrote:</font></div> <blockquote type="cite" cite><font color="#000000">Anybody else discover this little Jem?</font></blockquote> <div><br></div> <div>Previous to what I now do (which is nearly twenty years old), I used to use one of the drill guide blocks from the upright hammer hand-boring jig, the half-hole one (being the thinner of the two guide blocks).</div> <div><br></div> <div>But then I noticed that getting the three strings to contact the block still wouldn't guarantee the same hammer-to-string contact when you went from standard keyboard position to Una Corda. The only thing worse for a UC sound than un-level strings is hardener at the strike point.</div> <div><br></div> <div>So the final step in hammer re-shaping is to confirm that the hammer strike surfaces are level and square, usually with a straight edge sitting on the hammer flanges, but always being certain that what you're sighting across is the strike surface instead of slightly over the hill from it (one side or the other). I'd already figured out that it doesn't take to many mils of error here to turn one string into an audibly "open" one, all the more so with harder felt than softer. Anyone who has run across Don Mannino's "speed bumps" has noticed this.</div> <div><br></div> <div>With the hammer strike surfaces confirmed to be level and square, I check open strings, first in the standard position and then the UC for each note. If I hear open strings in the standard position, I make a mental note on the beach of my brain of the exact pattern LH/C/RH and see what  happens to that pattern in the UC (remembering off course that the LH string is out of the picture). If the open string pattern for the C/RH strings stays the same, it's the strings which aren't level. If the C/RH string pattern equals what the LH/C pattern was, then my strike surface leveling wasn't good enough. If the UC C/RH pattern bears no resemblance to either the standard position LH/C or C/RH, then the level at both the strings and the strike surface are out to lunch. But with good hammer re-shaping, it'll rarely be anything except the fist scenario (ie., the open string pattern has stayed with the strings instead of moved with the hammer).</div> <div><br></div> <blockquote type="cite" cite><font color="#000000">I've noticed it is important to put the device as close to the striking spot on the string for accuracy as  it is level strings at the hammer strike point</font></blockquote> <div><br></div> <div>I noticed that too, with a dial indicator under the strings and sampling the string level at various points approaching the actual strike point.</div> <div><br></div> <div>Bill Ballard RPT</div> <div>NH Chapter, P.T.G.<br> <br> "When writing a mental note, first procure a mental piece of paper"<br>     ............mental graffitti</div> <div>+++++++++++++++++++++</div> <div><br></div> </body> </html>