----- Original Message ----- From: "Phillip L Ford" <fordpiano@lycos.com> To: <pianotech@ptg.org> Sent: December 04, 2001 10:24 PM Subject: Re: Soundboard grain angle > How about having the grain angle perpendicular to the bridge or belly rail in the top section and along the bridge in the lower section? It would mean an obvious joint in the board but so what? > > Phil That's another one of those things I've thought about but haven't bothered with. As I think it through I can't see that the advantages are worth the trouble. Again, I can pretty much get what I want with ribs. But this does bring up another subject. Why are we so picky about the perceived 'quality' of our soundboard wood. The soundboard is simply a (more-or-less) two-dimensional, wave-carrying medium. To make an efficient soundboard requires only that the system be relatively light weight and relatively stiff. It could care less if there are 'character' flaws in the wood, as there naturally are. It doesn't care much at all about the color or texture of the wood. If fact, within some limits, it doesn't even care what the grain width is. (I'm assuming a rib-crowned board.) Some years ago I examined a piano soundboard made up of shorts end-glued together. The end-glue joints were made something like a lying down Z. After nearly 100 years the joints were still sound and the board worked just fine. I'm going to do this one day soon--just to prove a point. The problem here is that as we continue to demand only the super-premium wood for our soundboards we ensure a tremendous amount of waste. And, quite frankly, we don't have that many trees to waste them just to please our aesthetic taste and to fit a bunch of rules that no longer apply. If they ever did. For example, take a good, close look at the wood used in some of the late 19th century and early 20th century pianos. We would reject it out of hand as not being 'good' enough. Ok, end of rant. Del
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