[CAUT] 80 year old S&S hammers

[David Love]

The question is what were these hammers like out of the box.  My guess is
that the tone was fairly soft and that they were allowed to develop through
natural playing rather than being forced up. That process likely took
awhile.  Sadly, many customers lack the patience or the ability to foresee
just how those hammers will develop.  (Of course, that's also true with
heavily lacquered hammers or hard pressed hammers that can sound good out of
the box but quickly develop an uncontrollable stridency.)  I also notice on
these older hammers that the control of the thickness of the felt over the
molding is much more consistent and that the treble sections tend to have
less felt than the equivalent cold pressed hammers that I'm seeing today.
The thickness of the felt over the molding seems to be a critical component
for achieving controlled brilliance without resorting to hammers that are
over pressed or over lacquered to achieve the same effect.


David Love
www.davidlovepianos.com

-----Original Message-----
From: caut-bounces at ptg.org [mailto:caut-bounces at ptg.org] On Behalf Of
Waldrop, Craig
Sent: Monday, April 13, 2009 7:57 AM
To: caut at ptg.org
Subject: Re: [CAUT] 80 year old S&S hammers

Jim and Del,

I have also seen many of these older Steinways that were played gently and
had an extraordinary tone, with plenty of brilliance and power and yet soft
felt on the hammers.  I worked on them in the thirty years or more at the
Steinway dealer in the Dallas- Ft. Worth area and in their rebuilding
facilities for a decade or more.  I believe those hammers are made with the
old Wykert (sp?) felt.  They were wonderful hammers and the pianos never
sounded quite as good when we installed the 'modern' hammer replacements.

It is a genuine travesty that we have lost either the hammer-making
capability or the quality of felt that made them so good.  Maybe I'm just
getting old, but I have missed those 'good ole days' even in the early years
of my career!

Craig

Craig Waldrop, RPT
Staff Technician
Baylor School of Music
________________________________
From: caut-bounces at ptg.org [caut-bounces at ptg.org] On Behalf Of Delwin D
Fandrich [del at fandrichpiano.com]
Sent: Friday, April 10, 2009 8:12 PM
To: caut at ptg.org
Subject: Re: [CAUT] 80 year old S&S hammers


I have observed this on a number of older pianos. Some of those hammers were
almost ridiculously soft and resilient yet produced wonderful tone that
should be bright enough for anyone short of the profoundly deaf. And they
seemed to last forever. Much longer than the lacquered granite that passes
for hammers on many contemporary pianos.

ddf

________________________________
From: caut-bounces at ptg.org [mailto:caut-bounces at ptg.org] On Behalf Of Jim
Busby
Sent: April 09, 2009 7:24 PM
To: caut at ptg.org
Subject: [CAUT] 80 year old S&S hammers

All,

A few months back I posted an ad by the father of the "5 Browns" for a 1939
D for sale. Supposedly it was pick by Paderewski for his final concert.  I
finally got to look at the piano. It did have quite good sound, good
sustain, crown in the soundboard and the right bearing in the right places,
etc., no killer octave, per se, and all original except the strings, which
were 6 years old. I've never seen a CC soundboard that old that good. Did
they do rib-crowned soundboards back then? Maybe they just got lucky. Rick
Baldassin was with me and agreed that this one needed an action rebuild
only.

The main reason I'm writing is that the hammers were original, and although
it was played hard for many hours every day for many years, these hammers
still sound great! No grooves. No Lacquer. Very supple felt. How can that
be? 80 years and no grooves/wear??

I kind of chuckled at all the hype in his ad, but it was kind of refreshing
to find that it was a decent instrument.

Jim Busby

p.s. I think a school in Oregon is trying to buy it.