needles

[Horace Greeley]

André,

>You are so right Horace, about those needles, they are the best and only
ones and make you want to voice for ever and ever.....

"Stab me once,
and stab me twice,
stab me once again - 
it's been a long, long time..."

	From "Blood on the Hammers"
	a one time, some time voicing class, 
	perpetrated, err, presented by our eminent colleague,
		Richard Davenport.

>And I like Needles too, in a landscape you never forget filled with
desolate needles for ever and ever.....

And so much needles crime, so much gang sax and violins in the media...
	the horror, the horror.

Actually one horror which kept cropping up a few years ago was perpetrated
by folks using the
Dremel tool technique on hammers which had been over-hardened with some
variation of the
acetone-keytop combination.  The general problem in such cases was that the
needle, heated by
friction with the hammer material, left holes in the hammers which were, in
turn, surrounded
by areas of hammer material made harder by the interaction with the heat -
the plastic seemed to
have "setup" harder than it was previously.  Thus, problems inherent in the
use of acetone-keytop
solutions (insufficient, and therefore, nonhomogenous carrying of the
keytop material throughout
the hammer) were exacerbated by the further hardening of these (admittedly
limited) areas.

Another approach to working with such hammers is to rotate the action stack
(having removed it
from the keyframe...) so that the hammer tails rest on your workbench.
Place the tails in low sided
pans or cookie trays, and then quite liberally flood the hammers with
acetone.  Remembering that
it takes a while for the plastic to disolve to begin with, repeat this
flooding (perhaps several times),
spaced a few hours apart until the plastic itself begins to lightly flow
out with the overrun of acetone.
In between applications, cover the hammers with aluminum foil to retard
evaporation.  Once
the plastic is loosened, use an air hose (with OSHA approved nozzle, of
course!) and blow mightily
down through the hammers from the crowns, along the shoulders, and then
from the sides.  You
might need to do this more than once, applying more acetone in between.
Allow to dry, preferably
overnight, at least.

If the hammers have not been destroyed in this process (Please, let's not
get into liability issues with this one.  If you are using this procedure,
chances are that the hammers were garbage to begin with, and you
are trying to effect a balance between hammers which need drastic
re-voicing [and attendant work],
and replacing them altogether.  Caveat issued.), you should be able to
reshape and start over.

One assumes that no one would even think of using so draconian an approach
if the hammers, shanks
and flanges were not in sufficient repair/condition to warrant the work;
e.g. sufficient size/condition
to allow proper shaping, etc.

It's truly amazing.  A well voiced hammer isn't all that hard to get a
needle into, after all.

Best to all.

Horace


Horace Greeley

Systems Analyst/Engineer
Controller's Office
Stanford University

email: hgreeley@leland.stanford.edu
voice mail: 650.725.9062
fax: 650.725.8014