I had a spinet today that had all the hammer butt buckskins smooth with graphite so the back checks were unable to check. I've run across 8 or 10 this past year. Don't know who is doing it. Anybody care to explain the rationale behind this practice, if there is one?

Sounds like an older Baldwin. They used various synthetic buckskins and one looks like what you describe. I think the material just went bad with age.

These are full thickness buckskins. I'm familiar with the synthetic stuff. There's black graphite powder all over the stem and on the backcheck felt. I just don't get it. From what I've been able to gather, it's the same tooner doing it.

That's a factory defect, a material called Corfam. Baldwin made a bunch and for a time paid for repair. Not so today. It gets all over the inside and the hammers won't check. Also the butt "leathers" come loose. Personally I replace the butts, if a customer is willing to put that much money is a spinet piano, which is not often.

Thanks Sam and Ryan. I surely learned something today. I love this forum. Googled Corfam and found this:

http://www.ptg.org/newsletters/841/2006/07%5B1%5D.pdf

I've seen it too, and also thought it was some tooner doing it until I took a careful look and realized it wasn't graphite. A local school system paid for new parts, but that's the only dealing I ever had with the stuff. 'Nasty business!

Ran into another one of these black corfam Baldwin's today. Hammers bobbling all over the place. A "get me by remedy" is to roughen up (I used my knife blade) the corfam. It will at least get it to catch for the time being but, replacement is the only solution. What a dumb idea that stuff was.