Steinway hammers/time

[Allen Wright]

Group,

I've noticed something on our new (3 years old) Steinway D in the concert
hall at Northern Kentucky University which has surprised me a, and I wonder
whether others have experienced this. The piano has had rather hard hammers
from day one, and I have to really stay on top of the voicing (in the
winter, especially) in order to keep it reigned in to a reasonable level,
and voiced evenly. I should say also that the humidity control is poor,
although much better in the winter last year than it was before - whereas
the first two winters the hall was dropping into the mid-20s% R.H., they
figured out how to keep it up around 40 or so last winter. In the summer,
however, it goes way up, as high as 80%.

The piano sounds better in the summer, actually - warmer, less tendency to
be edgy, and more even. Easier to voice too, although not surprisingly I've
had to repin some tight flanges when the humidity gets that ridiculously
high, and some dampers have hung up, etc. But otherwise, I think the
humidity has a salutary effect on the sound. By the way, this piano is not
really played all that much, time-wise. A few hours a week at most (the
piano faculty keep it under pretty tight wraps).

Here's what surprises me: whereas, as hard as the hammers are in general,
I've never had trouble getting my voicing needle in cleanly to voice (which
has made it very manageable up till now), all of a sudden I notice that the
hammers have that unpleasant spongy feeling on the outer surface, but are
otherwise absolutely impenetrable with the needle. I've never experienced
this happening so suddenly on hammers that I've previously been able to
easily get needles into. I'm aware that it takes lacquer awhile to
completely harden, but I'm curious what people's opinions are regarding how
long this can take (as long as three years?) and whether people think the
sudden change of personality on the part of these hammers might be related
as well to the wide humidity swings the piano suffers?

Curiously,

Allen Wright, R.P.T
Cincinnati, Ohio