The Erard Project

Here are some better shots of the board, front and back, so that you can see the bridge, and rib structure. I have made quite a few modern soundboards, but none like this. The panel, as I said before, is about 5mm thick, with no appreciable taper that I can detect so far. Grain orientation of the panel is longitudinal, the individual boards are wide, some over 300mm, which means that, although they were cut from large trees, there is a large variation in grain frequency within a single board, the exception being the treble, where the boards are narrower, and the grain tighter. In the extreme bass, however, the grain width exceeds 3mm. Although the many of the ribs have, close to, modern widths, none stand much above 13 or 14mm. The ribs are widely spaced, except in the treble, where they are closer together, and very small. Where a rib intersects with the central spine it is mortised into the spine. The four ribs in the middle of the board pass through the spine, the joint there b...

Before I can remove the sound-board, I have to make a set of patterns to record the position of the bridges. I would do this even if I were not replacing the board. The patterns are made of Baltic Birch plywood and are registered to marks on the inside of the case. I put the piano on its side on the skid-board, so that I have access to both sides. At first I thought steaming might be a good way to go, but the belly rail section came off fairly easily, as the glue was somewhat dehydrated. I ended up soaking the straight side. In hindsight steaming would have been the better idea. Below is the board almost out. I apologize for the poor quality of the photos so far on this post, by the time I checked them it was too late. Here are some better ones, I hope. The thickness of the sound-board panel varies from 5.5mm to a little under 7mm. The curved longitudinal rib is laminated, vertically, from two pieces, the joint is barely visible. I don't know if they heated or steamed...

While I am completing the drudgery of removing the plate bearing strip, and the straight side sound-board molding, I would like to write a little about the Erard pin-block. This first picture shows the treble end of the pin-block stretcher assembly, I have replaced the upper stretcher pieces so that you can see the whole thing. As you can see, the structure is made of solid Beech, cut roughly on the quarter, and not particularly close grained. The lower shelf is made of two longitudinal planks. The vertical line in the middle section, is a split, otherwise the middle section is one piece from side to side. The row of rectangular indentations in the top piece appears to have been made by a type of bench hook, as illustrated in this plate from Roubo, Fig 6. Beech is a very dense wood, more so than hard maple, and, in this case, it is cut correctly. So why do these pin-blocks deteriorate so badly. One reason, and the one most often given, is over-stringing, in other words stringing ...

A close-up of the plate bearing, or support strip showing earlier damage from some exploratory chiseling. It's good to remember, at times like these, that future conservators, re-builders, will always consider what we do today, to be butchery. More damage at the tail. The area between the hitch panel, just above the bearing strip, was filled with a thin shim, made of Beech, as well as some glue, discolored here, as a result of contact with the plate. Here the strip is coming off (slowly) White vinegar, a thin blade, followed by wedges. The wedges are made of Sugar Pine, which is softer than the surrounding material. Below; close-ups of the sound-board rim joint with the bearing strip removed. Above I have drawn some lines, for clarity. The lowest line is the rim to case joint. Below that is the inside of the case, rising towards you. The middle line is the joint between the rim and the sound-board. The sound-board sits in a shallow rabbet. The broken line is the ed...

At this point I had originally intended to talk more about the pin-block assembly, and how it might be properly recreated. Instead I will move on to the removal of the hitch pin panel. The last remaining part of the plate. This will give some time to think about the pin-block stretcher assembly. The previous restorer did not manage to remove the hitch-pin panel, the photo above shows why. He did chisel around the perimeter of the plate, because he thought that perhaps the plate was built into the rim. This is perfectly understandable, as many American pianos, of this period, have just this type of structure. Had he not done this I probably would have done it myself, but as luck would have it I benefited from his 20-20 hindsight. This allowed me to look elsewhere. What I found was this; the plate bar support blocks on the hitch panel, are actually the heads of very large bolts, which penetrate the hitch panel, its support block, and almost entirely though the inner rim. After these,...

The pin-block completely revealed, with the central strut removed, as well. The pin-block and shelf can now be removed. As I mentioned before, the shelf is sitting in a tapered groove, there is about an inch and a half of material in front of this groove, that is keeping the block in. I know that it is possible to disassemble the front of the case to gain access to the groove, but this seems to me, more likely to result in damage, than the method I am using below. In the above photo I have removed the veneer, first from the front of the arm, and then, the thicker piece, from the inside. Although I think this is the better way, I would just like to say, that it really hurt me to remove this small block of wood. Below; I thought that as the groove, or dado (groove is actually correct) was tapered in my favor, that removing the shelf would be relatively easy, once I got it going. I was wrong. The shelf was very badly warped in the groove, and I had to work hard, the whole way ou...

With the iron bar removed, we can see the three layers of the pin-block stretcher. The lowest level is the shelf. The shelf has a layer of decorative veneer on both sides, which on both top and bottom, extend all the way to the front. The species of this veneer is (Platanus hybrida) European Plane. The grain runs front to back as with cross-banding. the next layer is the pin-block proper, and finally the stretcher. Above  a piece of the stretcher removed revealing the pin-block. Two wood screws pierce the block and penetrate into the lower shelf. The dark line is a layer of dark veneer under the pin-block face. The grain of the face veneer runs front to back. On the left, The central plate strut and its key. See below. The strut is fastened by the one one wood screw, pictured, but is not attached to the key, which sits in a shallow mortise. The gouge running diagonally down from left to right, is the remains of an exploratory hole drilled by an earlier explorer. The r...