Joe, I don't know what's going on now, but when I worked at Steinway, every grand action was weighed off. The person doing the job (I can't remember his name. Big old Irish fellow) got the action with a lead pattern for that model, then he proceeded to weigh and adjust each key. He would then drill and insert leads as needed. I also noticed that he rarely removed lead. If the key was to heavy or he didn't have a good location or size, he added weight to the front to counterbalance. Al - High Point, NC On May 23, 2012, at 11:13 PM, Joseph Garrett wrote: Paul said: "If I were interested in studying key leading patterns in different pianos by taking pictures of certain keys, which keys would be the most useful/representative? I find it easy to lay out all the Cs one below the other, but this does not show the typical changes in numbers of leads between sections, or where they occur. The difficulty I have found in trying to capture the first and last key of each section is that photos of black keys do not easily show the leads, which have been painted. Also, I'm not sure comparing #26 sharp leading with #27 natural leading is the best/most meaningful. Ideas? Does anything like this already exist someplace? Trying to learn about action ratios, inertia, etc. -- that is, from the point of view of what's been done in the past, is common to certain makes, models, periods of manufacture, etc. Thanks in advance for any suggestions." Paul, There are two ways that keys were leaded, imo. 1. a pattern was taken from the prototype piano and was used on all of that model, regardless of the considerations of friction, assembly line errors, different key material masses and any other thing having to do with the actual function of a piano. 2. There have been a few factories that made the action correctly, in regards to friction and action geometry, w/in the boundaries of mass production, (albeit small quantities), and weighed off every set of keys before the darn thing went in the crate. I don't think any U.S. companies fell into #2.<G> Studying what they did, really is of no concequence and is, imo, a waste of your valuable time. Better to take John Rhodes/Darrell Fandrich class on inertia. They'll answer all of the questions rattling around in your punkin'.<G> That's my take on that. Joe Joe Garrett, R.P.T. Captain of the Tool Police Squares R I -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <https://www.moypiano.com/ptg/pianotech.php/attachments/20120524/28f1f04a/attachment.htm>
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