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Hello, this is my first post, although I have been reading a lot of other posts at Piano World forum for the last couple of month, enjoying it a lot! I am Dutch, so please let me be excused for my English...
Since January I am the proud owner of a spotless Yamaha C2 from 2007 that sounds beautiful. It has not been played on a lot, which my technician has confirmed.
After a couple of weeks after the piano was placed in my living room, I experienced more and more 'random' double strikes and also that pitch, being perfect at the beginning, dropped by about 10-15 cent. After tuning, pitch has been more or less stable now. Humidity is not extreme in the Netherlands and rather stable at about 50 percent in my living room. The former owner had the piano in a sleeping room at lower temperatures which can explain the pitch drop due to a drop in humidity after moving it to my place.
The double strikes are not at pp or ff but more in between and only at a very specific level. But in any case never when the backcheck catches the hammer. It is also sounds more as if the hammer is pushed to the string again, giving it a 'buzz' sound.
I can feel a bump in my fingers every time a double strike occurs. I lowered the let off which definitely helped a lot. But I prefer a more standard and higher let off for optimal pp playing.
My technician thinks the double strikes are related to the high tension of the relatively new springs and suggested to play a lot... But I find this hard to believe because I experience the double strike right after the moment when the hammer has left the jack. I believe that after bouncing at the string, the hammer hits the jack again before it has fully escaped. At least this is how it feels because the bump in the key feels rather hard. I believe that bouncing at the repetition lever will feel less hard due to the 'suspension' of the spring. Also in that case lowering the let off will not help. I checked the regulation but all seems to be spot on except for the let off that could be a bit higher now. There seems to be enough after touch and I believe that I fully depress the keys when a double strike occurs.
By the way, I agree on the fact that in theory too high spring tension and lower humidity with less friction would explain the double strikes perfectly, but again it feels as if the hammer hits the jack and not the repetition lever. On the other hand, lower humidity will shrink the felt which could set the let off at a higher point increasing the risk of a double strike.
I didn't found this kind of double strike discussed at the forum. So my question is, is this possible? And if so, what can one do about it?
Thanks for your input, Hans
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Could be a lot of things, like too little aftertouch, too much hammer blow distance, too much spring tension. Get the action regulated. That should take care of it.
Semipro Tech
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If there are no friction problems with the action centers-having a technician who is skilled in regulation spend a day going over the entire regulation should solve the problem and many others you are unaware of-until they have been fixed and you realize how nice it plays.
In a seemingly infinite universe-infinite human creativity is-seemingly possible. According to NASA, 93% of the earth like planets possible in the known universe have yet to be formed. Contact: toneman1@me.com
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Thanks for your input!
Blow distance is spot on (45-47mm). As is the jack position to the knuckle and the jack position to the repetition lever. Spring tension is not likely because the hammer seems to hit the jack before complete let of and not the repetition lever.
Aftertouch could be an issue because this also depends on the humidity of the felt. Could test this by raising the hammers slightly by turning the capstan (will keep let off and drop untouched).
Please explain why the friction of the action center can create this problem?
My (skilled) technician told me that he found the action was perfect. I know that the previous owner had it regulated carefully. But the problem with experts is that they not always take the time to understand what their customers try to tell them...
It is not that I don't want to have the regulation checked, but I had no problems in the beginning and I found it hard to believe that the regulation is a mess because it plays fine. And thats not only my opinion...
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If it played fine, this topic never would have happened.
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If the hammer centers are really loose the checking with softer playing will not occur especially if combined with overly strong repetition springs. No really skilled regulator just sets the parts to the factory settings and assumes everything will work perfectly. You have to balance all the events that occur during playing to work with how the materials are performing. Your knuckles could be "draggy" and need teflon powder combined with a plethora of things that need to be compensated for in the most balanced way for great performance with all types of playing motions.
In a seemingly infinite universe-infinite human creativity is-seemingly possible. According to NASA, 93% of the earth like planets possible in the known universe have yet to be formed. Contact: toneman1@me.com
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As I understand it, there could be two main problems besides of all kinds of other regulation issues:
1) the problem is related to the let off and the rebounce of the hammer at the jack. My technician should first check after touch and need for lubrication of the knuckles.
2) the problem is related to the rebounce at the repetition lever. My technician should first check the backcheck function, friction of action centre, spring tension.
@BDB: action plays really fine except for the 'double strike' issue. Although I agree that the promise of Ed that after skilled regulation, the action will improve substantially is tempting...
I will check with my technician and keep you posted! Thanks for your input!!
Last edited by HansC2; 03/16/15 03:23 PM.
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One of the possibilities can easily be the jacks being too far under the knuckle. When approaching let-off you do not want the jack to spend any time dragging under the knuckle before it clears to allow the hammer to rebound and check. At particular levels of play, just between soft and medium, the hammer will pop off the jack every time and double-strike the strings. The jack movement is excessive in that case. See? This is a fine adjustment, easily overdone, but can be tested on each jack before the action is slid back into the instrument.
Your technician can actually rotate the jack under the knuckle to the point that a hard blow causes the jack to trip without lifting the hammer...which is too far! But, pushing that adjustment a little more forward, and getting the jack nicely placed under the knuckle and ready to trip, may help with your double-tapping hammers.
Too strong a spring? Your technician should have no trouble with fine adjustment of the repetition springs. Suggesting that more play will help is not correct; as your piano has had a chance to adjust to its new environment, fine regulation of the springs should now be done by the technician. Excessive spring tension does not assist an action towards working better...it just causes problems, like vague double-thumps at the end of keystroke, double-striking hammers, and it destroys a nice crisp feeling action. The hammer should rise smoothly, it should not bounce, adding or leaving in 'extra' tension helps nothing.
The C2 is an outstanding and reliable instrument. I have a few in my client files, churches and teachers mostly, and they are rock-solid in regulation and tuning. Good choice! One particular favorite is at a small performing arts center. A very clear tone, somewhat surprising from a smaller piano, and always admired by the performers who come to play. They are pleased to find this smaller instrument does a fine job of filling the 200-seat hall.
02.----ching! Yr. mileage may vary,
Jeffrey T. Hickey, RPT Oregon Coast Piano Services TunerJeff440@aol.com
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Hi Jeff, Thanks for your very clear and detailed explanation and your compliment for my choice. We both like this piano, that's for sure... And I also agree that Yamaha C-series has a rock solid action.
Just finished checking the jack positions of all keys. They seems to be perfect: slightly towards the keyboard as you suggest. Although it is interesting to try a more extreme setting and see what happens. After touch is also perfect for all keys: all jacks are fully escaped when the key is pressed towards the bottom. I already mentioned that blow distance is also perfect.
I agree with you about the spring tension. However, an other observation is that the moment the jack is away from the knuckle, the hammer is locked by the back-check and cannot hit the repetition lever and therefore can not bounce back to the string. So I don't think that the spring tension does play any role here. Pity, because lowering the spring tension would be fine with me because repetition speed is of no importance to me: my finger speed is more a limitation than any spring tension...
Maybe it is good to wait for a higher level of humidity again and increase the let off to the original level and see if the double strike is gone.
Within a couple of weeks I will ask my technician to tune my piano again and discuss to double strike again. I think you are right to adjust the jack position more towards the keyboard in combination with a high let off level (optimizing playing pianissimo).
So I hope to update this post in a couple of weeks.
Thanks to you all!
Cheers, Hans
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Update:
Not yet made an appointment with my technician. But...
Yesterday I found that when playing pianissimo with less force, the key was not fully pressed and likewise, the jack was not fully escaped. Although I had the impression that I pressed the key fully. The last bit of aftertouch seems to have more friction than expected. Due to this it seems that the key is fully pressed but actually it isn't. This could be the result of a drop in humidity? I expect that friction increases when humidity goes down.
I will ask my technician to lubricate the knuckles and see if the problem goes away. It could be the perfect explanation because I could not find any fundamental regulation problem. And as Jeff already stated: Yamaha actions are rock solid.
@Ed: you already advised to check lubrication (thanks for that!) and I hope you are right about that. But you also advised to use Teflon. I know my technician uses graphite and it seems that this was already used. Should I ask him to use Teflon?
Thanks (keep you posted!)
Cheers, Hans
Last edited by HansC2; 03/27/15 01:23 PM.
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I really would not contemplate using graphite on knuckles - I've seen this done and it has basically ruined the touch. Graphite is used on the jack surface and burnished to a high gloss slippery finish. The leather on the knuckle has a slight natural nap which helps the jack slide across its surface during let off. If you want to use Teflon powder on the knuckles fine, but graphite NO.
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Thanks Johnkie! Your completely right, I made a mistake, there is only graphite on the jack and lever, not on the knuckle...
Still a question left: so I understand that Teflon on top of graphite is not a risk?
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A little Teflon powder is rubbed into the knuckle leather Hans - I would suggest wearing a mask when doing it though, it is extremely fine powder and some people can react to this stuff quite badly
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Ok! so the application of Teflon is different to that of graphite. I definitely will take care using it: I will ask my technician because he is trained to do this! Thanks for your advise John.
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Lubrication is not the issue.
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SOLVED IT!
Just brushed the knuckles. After that the double strikes were gone, even after setting the let off a bit higher. What a difference in playing!
So at the end it turned out to be a friction issue of the knuckle and the jack. Because of this sometimes the jack did not fully escape form the knuckle and the hammer hit the jack after bouncing from the string. I will discuss the need for additional lubrication of the knuckle with Teflon with my technician.
BDB, Ed, Jeff and John, thank you all for your input and helping me solving this nasty problem. I am very pleased to find my C2 playing again as fine as it did the first days I got it in my living room.
Nice weekend to you all!
Cheers, Hans
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