Soundboard Shims

[Paul Kupelian]

Hi Ed,
I would hope that you would contact Dennis Milnar of Milnar Pipe Organ
Builders in
Eagleville TN, and validate your findings.  Most old organ pipes I
have worked on have
been anything but spruce.  They used everything from sugarpine, poplar,
basswood and others to make pipes with.  Unless you are *very* familiar
with spruce and it's properties, you might be getting some other kind of
wood for shims.

Regards,
Paul Kupelian, RPT
Syracuse Pipe Organ & Piano Service
kupelian@oswego.edu

On Tue, 14 Nov 1995 A440A@aol.com wrote:

> I have found that the best material to use for making soundboard shims comes
> from the front and back boards of old pipe organ pipes.  These boards are
> usually, truly  quarter-sawn, and much thicker than the sound board.  The
> side pieces of the the pipes are not suitable. If you will buy a thin-kerf
> blade, you will get almost as much shim out of a board as you will sawdust.
>  Also, the lengths are quite long and shimming long cracks can be done with
> one piece.  Find an organ repair business, and see if perhaps some old,
> unusable pipes are available.  the spruce is harder than most of the new
> stuff, and the color is often much closer to the color of an old soundboard.
>
> Ed Foote
> Precision Piano Works
> Nashville, Tn.
>