Bird-Cage pianos question

[John Delacour]

At 2:48 PM -0800 12/22/01, Robert Wilson wrote:

>Overdamping
>was the standard piano action type in those days.  You
>find a lot of variations where different designs were
>tried and discarded.  The birdcage was the norm and
>eventually was overtaken by the underdamper.

Not so.  It varied according to the maker's preference.  Erard, 
Broadwood, Schiedmayer and Kirkman never made an overdamper so far as 
I know, and though Bechstein was a latecomer, neither did he.  The 
underdamper action either preceded the overdamper or developed 
simultaneously.  I think it's easy to get a biassed view in England, 
where overdampers had a pretty long run.

JD