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Minor Deity |
Woops.
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Beatification Candidate |
No, this isn't playdough, but hammer felt. Ever been in on a discussion about the merits of hot-pressed vs. cold-pressed hammers? This gives you a picture of why cold-pressed hammers tend to be more resiliant and less brick-like. 
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| "The Veiled Male" Gadfly  |
Is it just me, or do those pictures give everyone the heebies?
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| Minor Deity |
and the jeebies.
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| Incognito Beatification Candidate  |
No heebies or jeebies for those of us who accidentally made careers of dealing with electron micrographs. Thanks, Ron, for the very view I was curious about when I got the Ronsens.
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| Beatification Candidate |
I'm not sure I've ever seen a square with this many legs:  I went looking for a picture of just a square action, but couldn't find one. I found a side drawing showing how the action works, but I wanted to show the splaying of the hammers and the leverage problems from the different lengths involved in getting the hammers to meet the strings.
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| Foregoing Practicing to Post Minor Deity  |
Actually, wool is pretty remarkable stuff. I've become a convert to wool since I've started wearing it more. It still beats synthetics in many ways, and the garments are prettier too. Here's a diagram of its remarkable structure:  
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| Beatification Candidate |
Let's continue this little detour into tech-land. You probably all recognize piano hammers. These are felt wrapped wood that make contact with the strings of the piano to set the strings in motion. The "bouncyness" of the felt is a major component of tone. (Think of the sound a tennis ball makes when it hits the floor compared to the sound of a pool ball.) Here is a shot of modern hammers - notice the different size/mass from different areas of the keyboard.  Next, here is how they are made. A single core piece of wood is held in place while a graduated sheet of wool is smoooooshed and glued into place. To speed production and glueing time most mass-produced hammers are heated - that's what the snarky microscope pictures were showing. After the glue sets up, the hammers are sawed into individual recognizable pieces. 
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| Serial origamist Has Achieved Nirvana  |
I recall reading somewhere that the typical replacement hammer set is cut into about 100 pieces and the technician may toss out a couple from the middle as well as one end or the other to get the sizes he or she wants for a specific piano. Do production hammer sets have any gaps, like skipping a few when you move from the 2-string to 3-string unisons?
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| Beatification Candidate |
Ah, now we move into Stanwood territory. Because wool and felt are natural, they are not really consistant. So then, because the piano action is set up to about a 5 to 1 ratio, any little differences in mass of individual hammers is multiplied by 5 at the fingers. The old tried-and-true method of balancing by adding lead to the keys continues the uneveness by adding uneven inertial mass to the keys to try to offset the hammer, geometry and friction uneveness. Soooooo, the discriminating tech will take those stock hammers and measure each and every one and make adjustments to get a smooth progression from bottom to top. Here's one example straight from the factory: (the curved lines are guidelines you'd like to see them follow)  To finally answer your question, no - the sets are just cut from the graduated stock - though there is more to it than that... It's up to the tech to decide which hammers not to use. The goal is NOT to be able to hear, or feel any breaks in the scale.gh
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| Incognito Beatification Candidate |
I'd be curious how that curve looks after a tech finishes what the factory started. (Meantime, I'm positively sick of looking at such charts and making them. I'm actually working for a change.    . I'm determined to wrap up my last edition of a very boring chemical engineering textbook and telling the publisher this is it for me. Sixteen editions of an 1800-page book is enough for one lifetime. One more and I think I'd go completely postal.  The goal is to start the new year with it behind me--so I don't have to return the advance--since I already spent it.  So I might be scarce around here until after the holidays. Except for short breaks. This is my end-of-a-20-hour- workday break.  )
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| "The Veiled Male" Gadfly |
This is most definately the plainest piano I've ever seen (Yuck...), but look for the pedals! 
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Minor Deity |
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| Beatification Candidate |
Aw, isn't this a cute keyring?  Dang, sorry about that! (now for something completly different...) 
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| "The Veiled Male" Gadfly |
A Steinway from a discussion on another board: 
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