Baldwin SD-10, was circle of sound

Horace Greeley hgreeley@stanford.edu
Sat, 22 Jan 2005 22:55:51 -0800


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Serge,

At 07:17 PM 1/22/2005, you wrote:
>Hi Ron
>
>I just lift my first SD-10 (20 years old) plate last week, very heavy
>piece of material and impressive engineering set-up.

Indeed.

>The duplex gismos make me perplex...

There is a good deal of misunderstanding about how the accujust system 
works.  Most of the ones that I have seen that do not "work" (musically or 
acoustically) have been modified by folks who do not understand the 
system.  Generally, entire too much bearing has been cranked in by lowering 
the strings on the hitch pins.  Getting the appropriate documentation from 
Baldwin, as you did, is the correct thing to do.

>Just got the information from Bladwin, that piano should have a very
>small amount of down bearing example: for a bass string 1 pound of down
>pressure on the bridge (maybe I misinterpret the info here) seen to be
>too small.

Actually, that is part of the design; and it works very well with that 
little pressure..  You have to be very careful to reset both the plate and 
the bearing according to the information which you got from Baldwin; 
especially the stringing order and related loading of the soundboard.  They 
used to be willing to "loan" a bearing gauge to do this; but that has been 
some time ago, so things may be different now.  It is very much like the 
Lowell gauge, but graduated differently.  Take your time and all will be well.

>Could you please be more specific about the improvement you made on this
>particular piano?

Depending on with whom you are speaking, the SD and SF instruments (both of 
which use the same floating plate and accujust hitchpin design) were the 
result of either advanced acoustic research or some pretty miserable belly 
work that meant that Baldwin was having to replace a number of 
soundboards.  As with all "new" things (not that this is, anymore, to be 
sure), this design takes working with and getting used to.

Note that Ron refers to the SD-10 as "another heavy plated and heavily 
rimmed piano which has quite outstanding tonal characteristics once the 
duplex noise and other stringing and strike ratio issues are sorted."  This 
is a clue, I think, to be on the look out for a very even, powerful scale 
which responds well to careful work.

I think that what Ron is talking about here is pretty standard, 
old-fashioned piano work.  There is no one-size-fits-all solution; each 
instrument will present different issues, and require different 
approaches.  Some will require a shorter hanging distance, some longer; 
others will respond better to very slight changes in bearing than to 
changing the strike point.

Best.

Horace






>Serge Harel
>
>
>
>Look at the SD-10! Another heavy
>plated and heavily rimmed piano which has quite
>outstanding tonal characteristics once the duplex
>noise and other stringing and strike ratio issues
>are sorted.
>
>Ron O.
>--
>OVERS PIANOS - SYDNEY
>     Grand Piano Manufacturers
>
>_______________________________________________
>pianotech list info: https://www.moypiano.com/resources/#archives

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