Bluthner Tuning (long-winded rehash of unison tuning)

[Susan Kline]

At 10:59 PM 2/3/2006 +0100, you wrote:
>I dunno Susan... :)
>
>... just seems to me like if you want to make sure you know what (if any) 
>effect the 4th string has on sustain for the regular unison strings you 
>probably should just remove it.  Damping it certainly inhibits any 
><<feedback>> the 4th string might have but it doesnt stop the initial 
>bleed off of energy from the unison. Just seems most likely you should 
>remove them...
>
>Cheers
>RicB

------------------

Well, yes but ...

I presume that the question we first asked each other was whether the 
fourth string aided sustain compared to a piano designed and built with 
only three strings in the high treble.

You can't take off the fourth string from a four-string piano and make it 
just like a piano originally designed for three strings. The bridges are 
spaced for four strings, and (I assume) the soundboard and ribs are 
designed for four strings.

Suppose you wanted to see how a piano would sound if it were a true una 
corda, that is, if it only had one string on each note for the whole 
compass. You couldn't remove two strings from the tenor and treble, and one 
string from the bichord section, and end up with the same piano as one 
designed for only one string per note (if such a strange animal ever were 
to be made ...)

Has anybody measured three- versus four-string Blüthners to see if they 
make the boards and ribs and rim differently? All that tension ...

ssssnn


>ssssnn writes.
>
>I think that depends on what you are testing for, Ric. Are you testing for
>everything that the fourth string might do, such as board-loading, etc? Or
>do you feel that the main effect of the fourth string is from the
>sympathetic vibration, which affects coupling and the overtone profile? I
>doubt that having a muted fourth string has anything like as much of an
>effect as the openly ringing one does -- in fact, I know it doesn't, from
>having tuned with it muted and unmuted.
>
>sssssnn