[CAUT] Hammers

[Ron Nossaman]

David Love wrote:
> Both Ronsen Bacon and NY S&S will need to be hardened as
> will Ronsen Wurzen and Weickert probably on this piano--at
> least at the upper end.  If the Ronsen Bacon that's on
> there has not been hardened I would do that first before I
> started switching hammers.  

As is very often the case, I agree with David's assessment. If 
you harden the hammers to something that will work wonderfully 
on a stock D, they will sound utterly wretched in this piano. 
Del's rib scales are lighter than mine, and I needle Ronsen 
Wurzens down, with the possible exception of the last half 
octave or so. Del's boards won't be as hard hammer tolerant as 
mine, and mine aren't particularly. I'm not interested in 
LOUD, or BRIGHT, but more in balance, tone, and projection. 
I'd rather stir the gut than grind the teeth. The endless 
"what's the best hammer?" discussions pretty much universally 
presume an unknown but accepted "standard" belly and string 
scale. Times and consciousness, hopefully, are changing.

The thing is, if you want the benefits of a good string scale 
on a functional RC&S board, it's not going to work and sound 
like the system with the shortcomings you went with an RC&S 
design to avoid.

Ron N