Loud Overtones From String

[Robin Blankenship]

Joel,
Having run into the same thing a lot with new pianos (I, too, work for a
dealer), I have found that needling from the flat side of the hammer right
above the sides and sometimes the tip of the moulding helps. I go all the
way through, making only five or so sticks. It doesn't alway work, but it
can reduce the obnoxiousness of the minor seventh.
Robin Blankenship
----- Original Message -----
From: <JCSwafford@AOL.COM>
To: <pianotech@ptg.org>
Sent: Monday, January 24, 2000 11:07 PM
Subject: RE: Loud Overtones From String


>Dear List,
>
>I work for a dealer. I have received many complaints concerning loud
>overtones from some unisons. Pianos of every manufacture have them I've
>noticed, especially from the bass strings. Voicing the hammer and seating
the
>strings does not help. About the only solution I've found is to needle the
>hammers excessively, but of course the tone is ruined then and out of
balance
>with the other hammers.
>
>Only their Chinese customers find this to be a problem. They think the
piano
>is defective with these extraneous noises emanating only from 1 - 5 unisons
>in the piano. I perceive the problem to be scaling oriented, but do not
know
>how to explain to the customer why it only occurs with certain unisons and
>not others.
>
>Has anybody found a good way to deal with or explain to the customer the
>nature of  this problem? It has nothing to do with sympathetic vibrations,
>the overtones are not pure, and they come from a single unison.
>
>Waiting for your thoughtful reply.
>
>Joel Swafford, RPT