As has been stated before, there is hardly any first partial sounding down that low. A quick demo that I've seen is to go to a large piano, and press around the middle of a low string and release quickly. You can see the string vibrate, and because you started the motion at the middle, it's almost all first partial. Funny thing is, you will hardly hear anything! Now, while it's still vibrating, use your fingernail, or something fairly rigid to touch the string around the strike-point. The sound blooms into what is expected for a note in that range. It is all the upper partials that our ears interpret as being the 1st partial pitch. The other thing to watch out for, is that in graphing all the partials for a recent presentation, it became apparent that while the upper partials have a fairly parallel relationship, the lower partials in the wound strings become very erratic by comparison. So by using 6:3, or 10:5, or 12:6 down low, the electronic tuning devices avoid the randomness of the string behavior. Trying to find that first partial and match it to a second partial even lower could lead to some wild tunings! Let us know if you find out WHY this person is wanting this. What sound is he looking for? Ron Koval Concordia University _________________________________________________________________ Get faster connections -- switch to MSN Internet Access! http://resourcecenter.msn.com/access/plans/default.asp
This PTG archive page provided courtesy of Moy Piano Service, LLC