hard grand hammers

[jolly roger]

>I've actually used lacquer thinner on hardened hammers. The logic is 
>that lacquer thinner thins lacquer. What it does is to dissolve the 
>lacquer away from the surface of the hammer felt. Still will need 
>needling.
>-- 
>Glenn Grafton


Hi Glenn,
               Hi Glenn, I have another technique, just as crazy as my
steaming ideas.
I call it wet needling, I've done enough of them now to partially step out
of the closet.

For severly over juiced hammers only.

Drench the hammers in acetone. in a well ventilated space. Wait 10mins for
the acetone to placticize the hardener.
Resoak.  Insert needles about 1/2" at about 1/8" intervals. Up over the
shoulders.  You can feel the shoulders flex with each insertion.  The
needles will go in easily to full depth.

Go for lunch, before coming back and trying the piano, give the
acetone/hardener a chance to firm up.
With out compacting the felt as much, by playing right away.

With hammers that are requiring this kind of extreme treatment, I will
advise the customer that it has a 50/50 chance of working, but new hammers
is the ideal solution.  This covers my butt if things don't work out. Note.
Never had to use the paracute.

I discovered this on new pianos that had been over juiced where I had a set
of replacement hammers at hand,  Never did replace the hammers. And have
observered some of these pianos over a 3yr period.

CAUTION:   This is not a technique for the novice voicer.  At this point in
time I consider it a back against the wall type solution. Once I have more
data, and experience, I'll get bold enough to write an artical on my findings.

Would love to get some feed back from others that have tried some thing
similar.

regards Roger