Paper Punchings Archiac?

[Jim Coleman, Sr.]

Hi Sy:

Mr. Rippen, the inventor of this piano had many exciting new engineering
features in his pianos. Unfortunately, there were some serious negatives
also. The balance rail was not quite as you described. Instead, the keys
were levelled by raising or lowering the back of the keys with a screw
similar to the one you described for the front rail. Then after the back
screw was used in levelling the keys at the front, the capstans were then
adjusted to take care of the lost-motion etc. The disintegrating plastics
were his downfall at the balance rail clips, the keys, the jacks, etc.
By now most of these pianos have been junked. They had aluminum plates,
reverse crowned soundboards, reverse threaded tuning pins, poor pinblocks,
strange bridle straps, strange aluminum damper levers, removealbe keybeds,
strange tone (weak), etc. I still have a Thomas piano, but it is impractical
to try to use it or repair it.

Jim Coleman, Sr.

On Sat, 28 Aug 1999, Sy Zabrocki wrote:

> List--from Sy Zabrocki   =20
> 
> Some new high end pianos sell in excess of $50,000. All that cash and we =
> still use paper punchings to level keys and set key dip. Wouldn't =
> someone eventually consider this to be archiac. Not really saying it is, =
> just asking the question.
> 
> About 25 or 30 years ago a strange vertical piano was exhibited at one =
> of the trade shows. I seem to remember the name as a Thomas and I =
> believe it had all plastic componets. The keys on this piano could be =
> leveled and key dip set with a clever set of threaded key pins. My =
> memory of how this worked is faint but I'll try explain.
> 
> Imagine an extra long balance rail pin as an axle with a small wheel =
> swedged about half way up the shaft. The lower end of the balance rail =
> pin is threaded and screwed into the keybed. So now place a cloth =
> balance rail punching on the round disc shaped (wheel) and place the key =
> over the pin like normal. The top end of the pin is slotted so it can be =
> turned with a screwdriver. Turning the top of the balance rail pin =
> either way raises the key up or down thus eliminating the need for paper =
> punchings.=20
> 
> Setting the key dip was similar. Again the front rail pin had a disc =
> mounted about half way up the shaft. The lower part of the pin was =
> threaded and screwed into the keybed. This time the front rail pin was =
> slotted at the bottom end. The key dip was adjusted by inserting a screw =
> driver into the hole UNDER the keybed. A cloth front rail punching is =
> now on the disc (wheel). As the front pin is turned from under the =
> keybed the punching raises or lowers, thus eliminating the need for =
> paper punchings. With this system there probably would be no need for a =
> key frame.
> 
> All this pertains to a vertical piano. The grand piano key frame has to =
> shift so it becomes complicated to apply this to the grand action.=20
> 
> Has anyone seen this system or any similar to it?
> 
> Sy Zabrocki
>