The Piano is surrounded by an mysterious fog of misinformation and erroneous belief.
This information is devoted to dispelling the more prevalent misconceptions.
Should I replace the soundboard in my piano? Piano rebuilding should include new soundboard We are firm believers in the installation of new soundboards into high quality instruments such as Steinway and Sons Pianos. The nay-sayers that believe one must keep the original soundboard of an instrument at all costs, are deluded in their thinking and are not facing the real world facts about piano soundboards. To expect a piano soundboard that is 75-125 years old to retain its original crown and cellular structure in the spruce, is ludicrous. The fact of the matter exists that soundboards have a life span. Pianos are subjected to 12-15 tons of pressure in the strung and concert pitch condition. This pressure is spread throughout the entire body of the instrument, and there is an enormous force at work to push and pull the inner and outer rims, belly and soundboard apart. The downward pressure that this force exerts on the soundboard (also known as the bearing), could be as much as 200 to 300 pounds combined. Steinway Piano restoration with new soundboard To expect the soundboard to withstand this force for 75+ years, and retain its original crown, tone and sustain, simply will not happen. The effects of this force are observed even more readily on the larger sizes of pianos, from 6 feet and up. A 9 foot Vintage Steinway soundboard panel, when removed, is usually flat as a table, and, more often than not, reversed in crown. If the new soundboard that is to be installed, is duplicated to the exact standards of the original soundboard being removed, then the piano will sound as it did when it was new. We are not here to reinvent the wheel, or second-guess Steinway's piano building processes. When a new board is installed, it is as the original was. All this being said, we also believe that considering the expenditure involved in the installation of a new soundboard, it is definitely not for everyone. If the budget for the restoration of the piano cannot absorb the cost of a new Board, then a thorough shimming, gluing and preparation of the old board is a must. Replacement is generally reserved for those that expect the ultimate in tone reproduction from their Vintage Steinway.
Probably the most damning thing that the layman can say about a piano is that it has a cracked sounding board. Horrors! It's ruined beyond reclaim!
Now, the interesting thing about these horrible sounding board cracks is that on one, - but on one, can tell you just what this crack does. Where-in is the piano injured? These questions remain unanswered. "But the piano is ruined. I heard my sister say the family Mason & Hamlin grand piano with several cracks in the soundboard claimed it was the best piano she has played on, but yet it was ruined because of the cracks."
A peculiar characteristic of this theory is that , no musician, teacher, piano tuner, salesman, piano designer or anyone else will wager that he can play on a strange piano and determine without looking where a sounding board is cracked and if so how much. A blind piano tuner doesn't know a sounding board is cracked unless someone tells him. It matters not, as long as the soundboard has crown, it could have one or five cracks, as long the the ribs are tied together with the soundboard, and the soundboard must have crown. The crown allows the board to sing, without crown at best the pianos will sound and no longer have the ability to truly sing.
A sounding board is a huge diaphragm that amplifies the vibration of the strings. It acts and performs as a unit. Tone does not ripple across like rings on a lake disturbed by a stone tossed into it. A crack is a little consequence because all the individual boards glued together to make up a sounding board are tied together by the ribs. It will excite as much air, cracked or not.
The only thing that might happen is that after 30 to 40 years the sounding board can become loose from the ribs. In this case it will rattle with one of a series or even all notes. A competent piano rebuilder can glue the board back down on the ribs and end this trouble permanently at a small cost. Or, at great expense, he can drive a wedge shaped piece of wood called a shim down into the crack with glue and the crack can't be seen. Knowledgeable rebuilders have never felt that this was justified, except that it makes a prospective buyer happy if the sounding board isn't cracked. As long as the sounding board is tightly attached to the ribs and has a nice crown, crack or no crack seems to make no difference at all with some of the finest musicians.