California Convention--10 ft 2" Fazioli

[Delwin D Fandrich]

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Re: California Convention--10 ft 2" Fazioli
  -----Original Message-----
  From: pianotech-bounces@ptg.org [mailto:pianotech-bounces@ptg.org]On
Behalf Of Cy Shuster
  Sent: January 16, 2005 7:22 AM
  To: Pianotech
  Subject: Re: California Convention--10 ft 2" Fazioli


  Don't know if it's steel, but I ran across this article about Del and his
plans to use a steel plate in future (written in 2003):
  http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/lifestyle/137253_pianoman02.html

  How is resonance controlled in such a bell-like material?  Isn't cast iron
desirable because it is acoustically "dead", dampening vibration rather than
acting like another soundboard and creating possible false beats?

  --Cy Shuster--
  Bluefield, WV
I've written about this at length several times in the past (and will be
talking about it next month in Sacramento) but, briefly:

None of us have a whole lot of experience with steel plates. My standard
reply when this question comes up is, "How many pianos with steel plates
have you worked on and has this been a problem with any of them?" My own
experience has been limited to building a few prototype and experimental
pianos in R&D labs. None in production. But I have never had a problem with
ringing in any part of the plate.

Conventional Wisdom teaches us that gray iron (there are many types of cast
iron, we are mostly concerned with just one type and that is gray iron) is
desirable because one of its characteristics is its high damping factor.
This is a desirable quality if one is building a machine base or an engine
block where it is desirable to absorb as much vibrating energy as possible,
converting it into heat. But this is not, or at least should not be, one of
the function of the piano plate. Here the idea is to keep as much energy as
possible retained in the string(s) for use by the soundboard assembly.

Steel has many potential benefits when considered as a potential material
for piano plates: it has much greater stiffness, it has some degree of
plasticity when stressed beyond it proportional limit (it bends rather than
shatters), it does not absorb energy, etc.

It is sometimes useful to remember that from time to time Convention Wisdom
is an idiot.

Del

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