Action rebuilding question

[Brian Trout]

Hi List,

At our local PTG meeting last night, a gentleman showed us an action from a
1905 Bluthner(sp?) grand.  It was his original intention to put on new
shanks & flanges, and new wippens.  Since it's an old action design, it
doesn't have a standard wippen arrangement.  Kind of reminds you of an old
square action.  The hammer shanks are not sticking out straight away from
the action rails, but rather it fans out from left to right, I would guess
25 or 30 degrees across the keyboard.  There is no wippen rail on this.  In
order for this thing to be retrofitted to work properly, the wippens need to
follow the same arc as the hammer shanks do.  The problem is, how does one
accomplish this?  Do you custom mill each of the flanges?  Do you build a
custom "saw tooth" wippen rail?

Anybody out there ever have one of these to do?  I wouldn't mind passing
along some input if I could.  The guy is considering just 'revamping' what's
there.  Although that wouldn't be bad, it would never be like a new Renner
action.

Thanks in advance for all of the wonderful ideas!

Brian Trout
Quarryville, PA
btrout@desupernet.net