Strings & Circuits

Ron Koval drwoodwind@hotmail.com
Thu, 17 Oct 2002 14:16:02 +0000


Jeff wrote:

Hi Ron,
So, for the SAT, did you use the Hamilton (243) tuning preset page?  or
calculate a new FAC tuning?
<snip>

I decided to investigate only the "measuring" tuning devices.  That left out 
any of the "template" types, like the Korg M-1200, the peterson autostrobe, 
or using any preset settings  from the SAT or RCT.  For the SAT tuning, we 
used a SATIII; the FAC numbers for that particular piano were 18.4, 6.1, 
7.9.   I'm not a SAT guy, so maybe someone else can jump in and give some 
specific answers to your questions.

Part of what these machines do is to make assumptions on what the 
inharmonicity will do based on the measurements taken.  It becomes kindof 
like a dot-to-dot puzzle.  If the machine has no way of knowing where there 
are big jumps, as opposed to smooth transitions in the inharmonicity,  the 
calculation will suffer.  On the older pianos that I used, the plain wire 
starts at Eb3, the newer ones shift at F3, I think.  There are a few wound 
wires on the long bridge.  Through some careful measuring, we were able to 
determine that in that section of the piano, the 6:3 and 4:2 octaves are 
about 3 beats/second away from each other, so you can set one or the other 
beatless, or choose somewhere in between.  (But you knew how hard that 
section was already!)

Ron Koval






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