---------------------- multipart/alternative attachment Eric, At 03:06 PM 12/11/99 -0800, you wrote: >If I remember correctly from 4-5 years ago the voicing done in the >Basement at Steinway Hall used a different technique than in the >factory. The factory voicers used water white lacquer and thinner, >avoiding the crown except in the high treble and applying from the >shoulders gradually. That is the more traditional approach. The type of lacquer has varied over time, and from voicer to voicer. > The C and A department used acetone as the thinner and perhaps the >pellets mentioned by Horace and were more aggressive in application from >the start. As I remember, Scott Jones was trying to have the basement >techniques used more widely in the factory. Yes. > Would the development of the use of acetone be related to the >different time constraints and the type of work being done in the C and >A Deptartment? If lacquer of one type or another is better than the >plastics is there any reason to avoid using acetone as the thinner? The answer to question one is that that is the excuse used to justify the change. Question two is less politically charged. My personal preference, when time allows, is to use lacquer thinner, rather than acetone. The slower drying thinner seems to allow a more homogenous penetration of the hammer. The acetone-thinned lacquer, by comparison, tends to wick to the areas of greatest surface exposure (most noticably around the edges of the hammer) and has a further tendency to "clump up" (an obscure technical term meaning some parts are unpredictably harder than others) more than lacquer thinned with thinner. David Ilvedson made a very interesting observation on this general topic in relating that a particular piano "cut through the mix". Lest we all forget, most folks no longer "hear" acoustic pianos as acoustic instruments. Those of us who deal with more "traditional" concert hall-type situations are in the decreasing minority. It must be Miller time... Horace ---------------------- multipart/alternative attachment An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: https://www.moypiano.com/ptg/caut.php/attachments/32/8f/a7/7d/attachment.htm ---------------------- multipart/alternative attachment--
This PTG archive page provided courtesy of Moy Piano Service, LLC