Soft pedal adjust

[Frederick G Scoles]

> Unless the customer knows that when the soft pedal is depressed, she should
> also play a little softer, there is not going to be much of an effect. Some
> people seem to think that the soft pedal is like the volume control on a
> stereo, and that the volume will decrease significantly. IMHO the soft pedal
> on any upright piano should be disconnected. In fact, it should never have
> been made part of it in the first place. It realy doesn't do anything, except
> make the action play lousy.
>
> Willem Blees RPT
> St. Louis
In general, I agree with Willem's point; especially since most newer
(after around 1915??) uprights use a type of cheap, simplified soft
mechanism that allows the action to fall out of regulation and also
allows excessive lost motion between jack and hammer butt during "soft"
pedal use.  More than one piano sales person, and books have
said that the current "soft" pedal design is probably there to fulfill
the need to give the upright a working third pedal to make it look more
like a grand, and to help it sell. Would uprights with one or two pedals
sell well?  Early century, several companies tried to solve the problem
with actual working (usually more intricate and time consuming to
regulate) soft pedals; but they fell by the wayside due to cost of
production, marketing, or technical reasons.  Some examples are the
Wessel, Nickel, & Gross lost motion compensated soft pedal; and the
Americal Piano Co.'s upright Ampico A lost motion compensator (1926).
These mechanisms can work well, but were costly to manufacture and
require several hours to properly regulate.  Most of these early lost
motion compensator systems I have worked on were previously neglected or
regulated beyond recognition (not working) by someone else. A well
designed upright soft pedal with good lost motion compensation can
sometimes play like lightning and certainly adds another dimension to a
good upright.  But, I agree that the standard Soft pedal design is pretty
worthless and on many uprights can cause grief. Some service manuals say
to regulate the hammer rail for "soft" with hammers half-way to string.
Actually, I think most uprights work much better if the hammers are
regulated about 1.5mm further away from the strings than half-way.

Fred Scoles, RPT