SD-10 Problem

[Roger Jolly]

Hi Kevin, 
               I agree with Bill 100%. If the termination piece is a
continuous piece in each section it is made from mild steel. String grooves
will be quite deep at this age and vintage if the forward portion has never
been dressed. The rear part of the termination has 3 grooves by intent, to
space the strings.
Ideal solution, Re string the treble and dress the forward portion of the
termination.
It will clean up the noise and increase the sustain.
A check that you can use to verify the problem, Take a blunt screw driver
between the strings in the forward duplex, twist, and you should hear the
string 'pop' out of the groove. 
Listen to tone quality for an improvement.
Later models have individual termination pieces,  These pieces are
precision machined, case hardened steel, and I have not seen them deformed
or grooved. They are silver in colour.  (The mild steel looks black.)
If the hammers have been reshaped or are badly worn, you could be playing
on pure lacquer.
it will give a similar result.
If your needles are tough to penetrate, Saturate the hammers several times
with pure acetone, to wash the lacquer further inward. DO NOT play the
piano until the hammers are dry, 2hrs is fairly safe. but next day is
preferable.
In severe cases, I will deep wet needle the shoulders. late 80's on wards
key top hardener may have been used.
Susan Klien did an artical for the journal earlier this year on the subject.
The most common problem with the later models, technician's tend to be a
little timid in voicing this section, The hammers were invariably doped
quite heavily. As the hammer wears, you are breaking into the hardener
zone, and the can sound like swinging bricks.
Susan look's after a performance SD10 that was restrung, but the
termination was not looked after, the noise reappeared in a relatively
short time.
Hope this helps 
Roger
 




At 04:14 AM 25/10/00 -0400, you wrote:
>Hi, Kevin,
>
>There may be two related problems here.  Any piano used for performance or 
>heavy practice use will develop string deterioration.  The treble wire 
>flattens on the front termination bar. This can develop in just a few years 
>on a new performance piano.  It happens on the older Yamahas, Baldwins, 
>Steinways with any regular, solid playing.
>
>The first rendition of the SD-10 had a capo design with the termination bars 
>which further exacerbated the problem because a its superhard surfaces.  The 
>later SD-10 had a front termination bar which was redesigned in several wys, 
>with individual sections per string, I believe, and a duplex tuning which
was 
>finetuned to reduce extraneous frequencies (a la Conklin's theory about 
>detuned duplex scaling).  The hardness was also changed to be less damaging 
>to the string and increase the string's ability to "grab" the termination 
>points, I believe.  Del can give you the real details on this.
>
>I have successfully rotated the string around a few mm and dramatically 
>improved the situation.  This should be done wholesale, even starting in the 
>high agraffe section.  On a single run of string with two speaking lengths, 
>turn back one pin and pull up the other to reposition the string on the 
>termination points.  I was pleased to see this in a detailed article in a 
>recent Journal.  It's a little ugly, but the trade-off is worth it.  Of 
>course, if the piano was breaking strings too, it is definitely time for new 
>wire.  Hope this staves of the Grim Reaper a little longer -
>
>We miss you in the Pomona Valley Chapter!
>
>Bill Shull, RPT
>
>In a message dated 10/24/00 10:57:44 PM Pacific Daylight Time, 
>ramsey@extremezone.com writes:
>
><< I serviced a SD-10 Baldwin concert grand today, and I found something
> really strange. I hadn't really noticed before, but when I got to the top
> two sections, the tone was really, really jangley. I said "what is going on
> here??"  Upon closer scrutiny, I noticed that the waste sections of wire
> between the individual capo thingees and the tuning pins had nothing more
> than bushing cloth underneath them. The problem with this is that the capo
> thingees leave the wire about 3mm above the plate, therefore, the waste ends
> were just ringing horribly. I mean, I've heard of the "Angels of Steinway
> singing along", but these sounded more like the bells of Hell clanging
> behind the Grim Reaper. This is the best piano that Baldwin produces; is
> this what they intended when they built it?
>         What am I missing here? Does tuning include restringing and
> installing felt? Is this the best that we as Americans can produce?
> Kevin E. Ramsey, R.P.T.
> Phoenix, Arizona
> ramsey@extremezone.com >>
> 
Roger Jolly
Saskatoon, Canada.
306-665-0213
Fax 652-0505