Repetition Problems

Horace Greeley hgreeley@leland.Stanford.EDU
Thu Mar 19 08:15 MST 1998


Mike,

Adding my two cents to the excellent advice from Ed and Danny,
how about, as an early trial, simply rehanging and re-regulating
as necessary?

I had used (factory) pre-hung hammers for years and years with no
trouble, until "they" decided to change the action about.  Caused
myself simply _endless_ headaches on several jobs, and haven't 
used them since.  While I still prefer to use the NY hammer on 
NY pianos, the boring, etc, is simply too poor to use as is.  Special
ordering of unbored, untailed, uncoved hammers used to be 
possible.  This (obvioiusly) gives you the greatest flexibility, most
important when dealing with instruments with, well, varying
plate height...

One futher note is that, while I agree with Danny about making the
flange pinning tighter as a fix, my experience is that this fix can
interfer with control/repetition on softer playing.  (Not an issue
for pianists who think of keys as on/off switches...)

Not much joy in Mudville when these things come up.  Pack a
nice lunch, have a good cup of coffee, take walks...oh, yes, I 
almost forgot, mumbling unintelligibly under your breath ensures
that folks will leave you alone.

Best.

Horace



At 07:54 AM 3/19/1998 +0000, you wrote:
>Hello University Techs,
>   Fast staccato repetition failure on a 1976 D with teflon wippens and
>newer shanks.  Hammer gets caught by the check with the jack impailed
>against the knuckle.  It's as if the hammer starts cycling faster than
>the key eventually jamming up.
>    A year and a half ago inorder to "save work",  i ordered "pre-hung"
>pre 1984 hammers/shanks from Steinway which turned out to be about 3/32"
>out too far out on the shanks.  Consequently the cheek block, fall
>board, and key slip all had to be moved out. The pinning was about ten
>swings, (much of this I repinned). At first the piano was a dull
>tendinitus D.  After MUCH filing and laquering the tone is bright and
>touch is light. Perhaps I went too far and have caused geometry
>problems.  Your Ideas, Thoughts, Experiences, Solutions with this
>problem would be greatly appreciated.
>
>Thank-you in advance 
>-Mike Jorgensen
>Central Michigan University
>
>
Horace Greeley, CNA, MCP, RPT

Systems Analyst/Engineer
Controller's Office
Stanford University

email: hgreeley@leland.stanford.edu
voice mail: 650.725.9062
fax: 650.725.8014


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