[CAUT] stack fit to keyframe

[David Ilvedson]

JD,
You have writtened that you designed piano actions...any photos or drawings?   Any patents pending...;-]
David Ilvedson, RPT
Pacifica, CA 94044





Original message
From: "John Delacour" 
To: "College and University Technicians" 
Received: 9/13/2006 5:23:20 PM
Subject: Re: [CAUT] stack fit to keyframe


At 5:01 pm -0600 13/9/06, Fred Sturm wrote:


Quite right. I should have added “in current production.” Ron Overs is the first to point out that Herrberger “went there first” in regards to knuckle/jack being on the convergence line. Ron’s action has several additional features.


I must say I find most of them superfluous and some of them based on false premises, but let that pass.  The action on the Roger's piano that he refers to in the patent specs, presuming it is the same as that found on pre-1914 Lipps, will be essentially the same but with a 10mm roller fixed about 17mm from the hammer-centre.  In the original version, which I illustrated, the knuckle is equivalent to a roller fixed 20mm from the centre, so that rather colours his claims in that respect.


    BTW, I like that felt on the jack tender, rather than on the letoff button. Prohibitively expensive to make, but a nice feature, IMO.


Yes indeed.  In fact the jack tender button is felt covered with buckskin, as is the lever-bottom.  The set-off screw is nickel-plated brass (still available), so the rolling action combined with the very low coefficient of friction between the radiussed polished metal surface and the buckskin means that the parts remain maintenance-free practically for ever.  The action I took for the pattern for my drawing/movie is from an 1899 Lipp 6'9" grand in my possession, 19 years younger than the one demonstrated on Stephen Birkett's site:
<http://real.uwaterloo.ca/~sbirkett/lipp_info.htm>,
which probably has a Keller action.


The piano of my childhood was a 5'9" Lipp grand with the same action, so for me it has always been THE action and without it I might not be in the piano business!  Herrburger-Schwander in Paris was, of course, the first and the greatest of action makers and Joseph Herrburger designed far more actions than ever reached the patent office -- I imagine he had better things to do with his time and money!  Even the Schwander B action which dominated the market till the mid 1980's ( Bechstein, Bösendorfer, Kawai etc. etc.) was never patented so far as I can tell.  It would be interesting to know why all the makers suddenly switched back to the old Herz design within a space of a couple of years -- or does Bösendorfer still fit the Schwander?





But my old action is a far better design than this and it's hard to understand why it was not more widely used.  Herrburger retired in 1900 at the age of 68 according to Dolge, so this action will probably have been his last.  Factory fires and wars and old age probably combine to explain which models survived and flourished, irrespective of merit.


JD












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