Bridge Notching Trouble-- Terry Farrells question

[Erwinspiano@aol.com]

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In a message dated 11/4/2002 4:28:00 AM Pacific Standard Time, 
mfarrel2@tampabay.rr.com writes:


> Subj:Bridge Notching Trouble 
> Date:11/4/2002 4:28:00 AM Pacific Standard Time
> From:<A HREF="mailto:mfarrel2@tampabay.rr.com">mfarrel2@tampabay.rr.com</A>
> Reply-to:<A HREF="mailto:pianotech@ptg.org">pianotech@ptg.org</A>
> To:<A HREF="mailto:pianotech@ptg.org">pianotech@ptg.org</A>
> Sent from the Internet 
> 
> 
>        Terry wrote
> I'll have some bridge notching coming up in a while. I have always had some 
> trouble in the past keeping the notched top edge sharp. By this I mean I 
> line the chisel up in the middle of the bridge pin holes, start my downward 
> stroke (I try to do a bit of a curve so that the top edge is a large angle 
> - not vertical, but more vertical than horizontal), but then after going 
> downward the first tiny bit (maybe one millimeter or so), I need to angle 
> the chisel more toward the horizontal. At that point I find my chisel 
> riding on the top bridge-pin-line edge that I just cut so nice and cleanly. 
> The riding motion tends to round off the nice top edge that you want to be 
> ever-so sharp. How not to do that? I can see that cutting a straight angle 
> would fix that problem, but I've always thought that the steeper you can 
> make the top edge, the better the termination (assuming you don't undermine 
> the bridge pin). I think Fazioli puts a vertical drop on their bridges. 
> Those pianos sound OK to !
> me.
>     

          Hey Terry
> 
>    I thought about your question again today as I was busily notching. 
> Everybody has there own way of doing this and heres mine. I noticed that if 
> you look really closely at a side view of a really nicely notched bridge  
> there is a really nice scoop look moving down and away from the pins 
> starting at the point the where the strings are bisected.
>     II have found of course really sharp chisels are  required to carve 
> these notches. I'm sure that's no mystery to you. The key for me was two 
> things. I use a Freud 1 inch chisel with the back slightly rounded and I 
> use it upside down for the final cut. I hog out most of the wood from the 
> notch with an offset Japanese dovetail chisel and then on my last cut or 
> two with the Freud I bisect the pin line and with a smooth but quick motion 
> push forward and down the back of handle at the same time. I found that 
> moving to slow is less accurate and successful but faster requires the 
> confidence to just go for it. Does that make sense? 

      If every thing is working well I can hold the bridge up at eye level 
and see if our notched are imitating the > same kind of beautiful swoop those 
> guys did at the factory. The tough thing for us is that we don't do this 
> everyday like the good ole boys did so we kind of have to mentally think it 
> through each time.  It used to take me several hours to notch a bridge. 
> I've got down to bout hour and half. I find that if I can do one a month or 
> so I stay sharper than if I've had a 3 month hiatus. It's all about 
> practice and frequency like the rest of our business. Hope that helps.
>                 Dale Erwin


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