Keep on filing...

[Andrew and Rebeca Anderson]

Danilo,
With the repetition at rest and the hammers 
rotated up and out of the way, the jack top 
should be below the yoke of the 
balancier.  Ideally not much below.  This is 
necessary lost motion in order to permit the jack 
to re-set.  You can check by using a card and 
dragging it over the yoke.  If the card catches 
on the jack, the jack is too high.
A Steinway regulation method to check this when 
the hammer is resting on the repetitions is to 
press the jack tender down, let go and the jack 
should reset winking the hammer a little.  If the 
hammer doesn't wink, you have more lost motion 
then necessary.  If the jack cannot reset consistently, you don't have enough.

I like to regulate drop close to the strings and 
I like to have drop and let-off coincide.  This 
does make the instruments more weather sensitive 
as a 1 - 1.5 mil drop is not much where humidity 
related wood movement is concerned.  Of-course 
the instruments that get that kind of regulation 
are usually climate controlled here.

This requires a definite but slow rise of the 
hammer with the repetition spring.  Springs are 
not easy to get just so and you will have to 
develop the skill of setting them by repeated 
effort until you start getting the result you 
want.  You want to be able to avoid 
bubbling/double-striking which occurs when 
balancier pinning is too loose and or when the spring is too strong.

It is important to note that many action 
adjustments are interactive with other 
adjustments.  That is, when you change one, the 
other is thrown out.  On a new piano or when an 
action is worn, I will go through several times 
adjusting and readjusting as things get closer to 
ideal.  You may want to obtain an action 
regulation book that takes you through the steps 
in order of greatest efficiency.  Yamaha sells a 
video from their website on action 
adjustments.  I recommend it.  There are some 
differences in approach between instruments, 
Steinway follows a slightly different procedure 
for example, but the overall illustration is 
worth becoming familiar with visually.

Andrew Anderson, Artisan Piano

At 08:12 AM 6/20/2007, you wrote:

>Thanks, Tony, I enjoyed this mail!
>
>I use this Steinway O to give concerts in this 
>church. A few years back I had a tuner tune it. 
>When he was finished, I asked him "So, any 
>problems? -No. Loose pins? -No. False beats? -No 
>Action issues? -No." I was quite baffled. I even 
>tried to convince him that something must be 
>improvable by playing a bit and asking "Is this 
>or that really supposed to be like this, 
>ideally? -Yes, it's fine." Then he added "Just 
>avoid the sun, it makes it go out of tune 
>faster." Well, it gave me another reason to 
>teach myself. On the opposite end, I gave a 
>recital in a church on a 70's Steinway B, which 
>the organist had hired someone to renovate for 
>ca $15000. The members of his constitution were 
>forever complaining "Did you really have to 
>spend so much money?" He asked me to help him 
>out by taking every opportunity to praise the 
>instrument. Which I dutifully did. "The best 
>piano I've ever played on, it's as good as a 
>brand new one, and they cost bla bla, it's 
>amazing what value you can get from such a 
>perfect restoration!" It was easy, as I was speaking the truth...
>
>About the position of the jack, you wrote
>"..the repetition regulating screw at the hammer 
>end of the repetition lever requires adjusting 
>to allow the top of the jack to be just below the top of the repetition lever."
>I thought it was suppposed to be just above the 
>top of the repetition lever? And I've adjusted 
>it that way. Please be so kind as to confirm 
>this! Or do you mean the position of the jack at 
>the moment the hammer is released from check and 
>lifted up by the repetion lever?
>
>"Your drop screw may be too low stopping the 
>repetition lever going up high enough"
>I've set it to make the drop about a mm or so, relying on my eyesight.
>You've given me some new things to look out for, 
>so next time I get to the instrument, I'll check 
>everything carefully: I'll try to add some 
>weight to the hammer shank (someone wrote 
>somewhere about wrapping a bit of solderingmetal 
>around the shank?) and carefully observe the 
>relative positions of the jack/repetitionlever 
>from rest to full depression of the key and 
>back. Anything else I should think of?
>
>Thanks! Danilo
>
>
>
>----------
>Dags för jobbintervju? 
><http://g.msn.com/8HMBSVSE/2755??PS=47575>Här får du bra tips

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