<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN"> <HTML><HEAD> <META content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1" = http-equiv=Content-Type> <META content="MSHTML 5.00.2919.6307" name=GENERATOR> <STYLE></STYLE> </HEAD> <BODY bgColor=#d8d0c8> <DIV> </DIV> <BLOCKQUOTE style="BORDER-LEFT: #000000 2px solid; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-RIGHT: = 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px; PADDING-RIGHT: 0px"> <DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial">----- Original Message ----- </DIV> <DIV style="BACKGROUND: #e4e4e4; FONT: 10pt arial; font-color: = black"><B>From:</B> <A href="mailto:davidlovepianos@earthlink.net" title=davidlovepianos@earthlink.net>David Love</A> </DIV> <DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>To:</B> <A = href="mailto:pianotech@ptg.org" title=pianotech@ptg.org>Pianotech</A> </DIV> <DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>Sent:</B> Saturday, March 29, 2003 = 11:34 AM</DIV> <DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>Subject:</B> Knabe counterbearing arrangement</DIV> <DIV><BR></DIV> <P><FONT face="MS Sans Serif" size=2> <DIV>I'm restringing an older Knabe (1920) and wondering if I can't = improve the counterbearing arrangement to improve tone a bit.  In the = topmost treble section (67 - 88) there are two counterbearing bars, one which = is quite close to the termination and one which is about an inch or so toward = the tuning pins that is normally covered with felt.  In the next = section down (47 - 66), the counterbearing bar is normally covered with felt.  = This is in a section in which the area leaving the termination point (agraffes = in this case) is normally left undamped in any way.  The other part of = the problem is that the counterbearing height is not quite sufficient to = get the string at 90 degrees to the pin.  My though is to put in brass = half-ovals in these sections.  Will I be creating problems for myself?</DIV> <DIV> </DIV></BLOCKQUOTE> <DIV><FONT face="Lucida Sans">We nearly always install brass = half-ovals for this purpose. The principle is keep the string segment reasonably short and = the string deflection angle high enough to efficiently terminate the = speaking length without it being so abrupt as to encourage the strings to break. I wrote = an article on this once.</FONT></DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV><FONT face="Lucida Sans">Del</FONT></DIV> <DIV style="BORDER-LEFT: #000000 2px solid; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-RIGHT: = 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px; PADDING-RIGHT: = 0px"></FONT> </DIV></BODY></HTML>