Bridge pin angle

[Ron Nossaman]

 >>Or just cutting the notch a bit  farther back. There's no performance
 >
 > reason I
 >
 >>can see that the notch edge has to exactly bisect the pin.
 >

> Is this just another old wives tale then? I was under the impression that
> this would lead to a different vertical and horizontal termination--which
> would cause the string to ring at 2 discreet frequencies at the same time.
> I know of at least one 9 foot where this *is* the case in a low bass string
> that is poorly notched. Perhaps what I am hearing is nothing to do with the
> notch?

That's what I was told too, from when I started back when, to the 
present day. The problem is, that just doesn't hold up to even 
casual inspection. Go look at new pianos in the exhibition hall at 
the convention this year. You'll see some that have notches cut back 
so far the bridge pin in entirely in the notch cut - but the strings 
aren't wild. That doesn't fit the explanation. Why? The notch looks 
exactly right, but the false beat is still there. That doesn't fit 
the explanation. Why? Now you find wild strings in the field, and 
stop the false beat temporarily by back bracing the pin with a 
screwdriver. The relationship between the notch and the pin didn't 
change, but the beat stopped. That doesn't fit the explanation. Why? 
Now you try to move a string up a bridge pin and discover how 
difficult it is to do that. To get the false beat by the old 
explanation, the string would have to slither up and down the string 
easily. It doesn't. That doesn't fit the explanation. Why? Seating a 
string sometimes clears up a false beat temporarily. Seating the 
string didn't change the relationship between the notch and the pin, 
so why did the beat stop? That doesn't fit the old explanation. Why? 
Now go back and read the 43,000 words written on the "why" in the 
last week or so (with plenty more of the same for some years back), 
and take another look at that early explanation of false beats. Then 
ask yourself ... why?

I doubt if what you're hearing in that string has much of anything 
to do with the notch. Without seeing and hearing it, I'd be more 
inclined to suspect a longitudinal first. What have you tried in the 
way of diagnostics?

Ron N