When one says "heavy" action, does one mean that there is more resistance to one's efforts to trigger a note, or that the keys do not quickly return to neutral following a hammer-strike?

Hi Arnie:

When a pianist says 'heavy action' they are referring to the effort required to make the piano perform at an expected level. When a technician says 'heavy action' they are referring to the touch weight, in most cases. The 2 do not coincide. A perfectly weighted action with perfect touch weight could feel heavy to a pianist if the inertia is high (too many leads in the keys, heavy capstan too heavy hammers) or could feel light if the hammers are loud.

The only impoertant thing is how it feels to you and you should ignore what other people experience as they are not you.

Take care,

Steve

Your first statement denotes a “heavy” action; your second statement denotes a “sluggish” action.

The resistance encountered to “trigger” the note is what makes the key-touch heavy, medium heavy, medium light or light. The re-setting of the action for another “trigger” should be fast as lightening.

Of course, this is just my thoughts on the subject.

Take care,

Rick

Hi Rick:

Nice thoughts on the subject. However, I find I can change what a pianist thinks is a 'heavy' action to a 'light' action by voicing and regulation. The friction and touchweights are identical at the beginning and end. In some cases, adding weight to a hammer can make a 'heavy' action feel 'light' by increasing the volume of the piano with the same effort, even thought the technical and real weight to 'trigger' has increased.

Take care,

Steve

Hi Steve, and thanks for the comments.

Yes, I would like for you to be my mentor and I could be your apprentice!

There is certainly more to piano technology than meets the eye (and ear)!

I like a medium heavy action and I like for it to be as fast as lightening. Of course, my fingers could never move that fast!

Thanks,

Rick

Double post... sorry.

Your downweight upweight ratio denotes whether the action FEELS heavy to the pianist though one could have a very high down weight but corresponding upweight and the action may not feel heavy to the pianist. The "sluggish" thing is when the upweight is not at an acceptable gram count compared to your downweight.

Of course friction is the main culprit as for your ratio being not acceptable. Of course as Steve makes mention voicing, regulation,damper lift can give one the illusion of a lighter action,but it doesn't actually change the numbers.

Steve, That interests me as for hanging that heavier hammer in making the actual perception of the touchweight to the pianist as being lighter.In that one is working on at least a 5 to 1 weight convergence from the hammer weight to the actual touchweight,I'm curious how one can pull that off.

I used to think that in hanging a heavier hammer that it could increase the unacceptable upweight over that acceptable threshold(gram count) but it doesn't work. If you add a brick to the down weight side of the fulcrum the upweight ratio won't increase at the same ratio. I've noticed in eliminating friction,it does actually increase the upweight more percentage wise than lessening the downweight.
Now that I have totally confused everyone. I was obsessed with this for a while.

Hi PB:

I think David Stanwood covers this a bit on his web site. I often use hammers where I add weight in the molding in the treble and bass. This gives the hammer more contact weight to drive the string and thus more sound than a lighter hammer. This is not universally so, but there are many instances where it is. The increased force of the hammer/string contact is a greater effect than the added weight to the keytouch, therefore giving the feel to the pianist of easily accessible power for a given hand position. Just another tool in the arsenal of tone building and performance enhancement.

Steve