Help (please)! Voicing

[A440A@aol.com]

 Tom writes;

>I'm finishing up a hammer replacement on a Yamaha DC7 Disklavier in a
>recording studio. They're going to start using it on Monday.
>These things are absolute bricks! I'm wanting to get that rich full
>"bloom" in the tone that I've heard in many Yamahas.

    It shouldn't be too hard to let them use it once or twice before you let
too much compression go out of the hammers.  It is a rare studio that
complains of "too bright".

    If you have done a whole lot of needling on the shoulders, then there is
going to be some time needed for that felt to rearrange itself into the more
resilient structure needed for maximum tonal production. Did you lightly
hammer the felt after all that shoulder softening?

>I'm hesitant to needle the crown. However, would it be appropriate in
>this case, say with needles extended about 1 mm?

   If you place 1 mm of soft felt on top of a rock hard core,  it will just
chop those fibers into dust in a hurry, and then you will need to do it
again. This treatment will kill the high frequencies above 4K that give you
the ping in the attack, but it seems to do little to increase the amount of
fundamental or orchestral range of tone.

       John McKone wrote of the "non traditional" needling done down through
the crown.   From what I have seen, this often IS traditional, even if it is
not  talked about.  EVERYBODY seems to deep needle the top crown at times.
 After getting the shoulders soft,  it is often found that there is a hard,
crunchy spot under the crown, and you do have to fire a round in there to get
any change.

     Fred Drasche even told us at a Steinway seminar that voicing is
accomplished by pushing the needle right down through the crown. ( He said,
"Don't waste your time on the shoulders,  the voicing comes from what is
under the string!)
     I know, these are very different hammers from the Yamaha bricks!  I just
want to say that "traditional" voicing techniques, in the field, often
enclude deep top needling, just like John says.

Regards,
Ed Foote
Precision Piano Works
Nashville, Tn.