the myth of the finite life of wood grain

[Ron Nossaman]

> I work on several pre-modern pianos and the boards still sound quite 
> alive as well.  However, it would seem that the soundboard performance 
> requirements for very low tension scales, as these all are, would be 
> somewhat different from those of more modern instruments. I assume that 
> would have manifested itself not only in the crowning procedures but the 
> ability of the panel to expand and contract without undue compression 
> stress.   Comments?
> 
> David Love


 From my limited experience with pre-modern pianos, this looks 
to be a reasonable assessment. What would pass as a 
categorically functional soundboard in an early instrument 
would most likely fail to meet even minimal functionality 
standards for a modern instrument, which makes a heads up 
comparison utterly meaningless. That was then, and this is 
now. The rules have changed, so the scoring criteria must 
necessarily follow suit. Low expectations, met by low material 
stresses in the assembly, should be more realistically 
expected to meet the resulting performance criteria over a 
long period of time than high expectations, with higher 
performance criteria, hopefully met by high material stresses 
in a similar assembly. This, I think, should be a pretty 
obvious starting point.
Ron N