Ronald R Shiflet wrote: > > List, > I'm in the middle of putting the Yamaha dampers on the Steinway > L. I went ahead and decided to glue the red backing to the white felts. > Everything went great. I was able to get that done and also gluing the > singles onto the damper heads. > The next day, I went to continue the project. All of my wedges, > split wedges and flat felts had buckled all over the place. What did I > do wrong? If I continue, will cutting them from a strip into individual > pieces solve the problem or do I need to remove them and start all over? > > Ron Shiflet Ron, What kind of glue did you use? If it was hide glue, did you test it to see if a drop made a ball on a scrap piece of felt? (ala Spurlock) This is to make sure it is not too thin; which would carry too much water into the felt. But I think the basic problem is gluing felt to felt. Better to glue felt to the wood first and then the wedges to the felt already on the wood. One other thing that we do, is use Spurlock's teflon felt cutting block to put the initial clamping pressure on the wedges, (if the wires are off). Glue the wedges on the heads, line them up straight, then insert them into the appropriate shape slot in the cutting block, and clamp with an ivory clamp protected with felt. You can do about four across which is plenty of time for the glue to set. The end result is straight and firmly attached. If the piano is in the shop, glue the felt on the head and install it in the piano and let the underlever weights supply the clamping pressure. On thing you might try with your crinkly felt, is steam them with a tea kettle briefly before you glue them to the head. This may soften the glue enough to allow them to be attached correctly. Loads of Luck, But I think you'll have to buy more felt also. Warren -- Warren D. Fisher fish@communique.net Registered Piano Technician Piano Technicians Guild
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