Hi folks... Just thought I'd mention that I starting a systematic collection of sustain times for 3 notes in every grand piano I run into. I record each pianos A5, A6, and F7 with my portable puter and also note sustain times as my ear interprets them. I have a stop clock and I do 5 checks for each note and take the average. Piano type, serial numbers, and general condition notes are kept as well. So far... the results look to be interesting, and do not reflect anything in particular about piano type or age.... rather the sustain times seem rather random. For example.. just this weekend I checked a 5 year old Yamaha C7, a 20 year old Hamburg C, and a 20 year old Yamaha C3. The C7 was the definitive looser... with only 5.6 seconds sustain at A6. The Hamburg C had 7.2 and the C3 had 7.7 That being said.. the C7 was easily the nicest sounding instrument. All three have been well kept, both the Hamburg and the C3 have had a new set of hammers in the recent past, and a good deal of action work. The Hamburg recieved a full Stanwood revamp of the action by one of our local techs last october. I do the voicing on all three so thats more or less a constant. Cheers RicB -- Richard Brekne RPT, N.P.T.F. UiB, Bergen, Norway mailto:rbrekne@broadpark.no http://home.broadpark.no/~rbrekne/ricmain.html http://www.hf.uib.no/grieg/personer/cv_RB.html
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