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The Music Trade Review
JULY 16, 1927
27
The Technical and Supply Department—(Continued from page 25)
tor, is once recognized its existence may al-
ways be allowed for, so that the results ob-
tained from it may be accepted as they stand,
since the distortion will be constant and there-
fore may be ignored in practice.
Bass Strings
Nor is this all. No practical scientific-minded
reader of this department will be disposed to
deny that among the various elements in tone
production with which we have to deal the
bass string presents problems insistently call-
ing for better investigation. This may be said
with all respect to the makers of bass strings,
who have struggled most successfully to pro-
duce good tonal results in the face of de-
mands from piano manufacturers who do not
know what they really want. The point is,
however, that here we have a great many vari-
ables, and that we must not let slip any oppor-
tunity to eliminate some of them, at least. The
more we can substitute ascertained constants of
physical property and behavior for the pres-
ently existing variables, the better off we shall
be. And this to an extent can certainly be
done. To take a single example, it is highly de-
sirable to ascertain just where and when a
string ceases to vibrate as a string and begins
to vibrate as a rod, owing to excessive load-
ing as compared with length and pitch. From
a practical standpoint this is not a question of
vast importance in connection with large grand
pianos, but in connection with the small in-
struments which are now so very popular, and
the still smaller ones which are likely to ap-
pear, it becomes extremely pressing, being
then in fact a matter of vital interest. Some-
how we must work out satisfactory scalings for
bass strings on very small instruments, nor can
we afford, in these times, to spend some years
in turning out one failure after another, in the
confident expectation of some day finding a
solution. The matter calls and calls insistently
for immediate investigation. If and when such
an investigation shall have been pushed to a
successful conclusion, no one will be better
pleased than the bass string makers, who in-
deed have every reason to feel that their work
has been too long hampered by poor and hap-
hazard specification. In fact it would not
be stretching the truth too much to say that in
general the bass string maker has to do his
own specifying in all respects save that of
vibrating lengths. And this, we shall all agree,
is not as it should be.
It would be easy to multiply the number of
possible problems for investigation by the vis-
ual and photographic method. I shall mention
here just one more.
Striking Points
We need more light on the question of strik-
ing points. Acoustic investigation until now
has given contradictory results where no con-
tradition could have been anticipated. Young's
theorem can no longer be held, in the light of
the experiments conducted by Ellis and Hip-
kins. That is to say, we can no longer assume
that a blow upon any nodal point of a string
blots out the partials which arise at that point.
The hypothesis in this simple form was very
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convenient, and offered a simple set of rules for
determining the best striking point for each
string on a pianoforte; but its validity has been
successfully called in question and we are
again left to conjecture.
Evidently then the study of these matters is
no longer to be considered as remote from
practical realities.
And I think that during the next two or
three years I shall be able to show some
worth-while results proceeding from studies
conducted on these subjects and in these ways.
Piano Scale Making
Albert B. Vant, of 543 Academy street, New
York, has published, under the title "Piano
Scale Making," a set of reduced drawings and
some useful pages of measurements and direc-
tions, detailing the practical steps to be taken
in drafting the scale of a small grand piano
and in laying out the plate pattern, the case
patterns, the measurements for action housing
and all other matters of similar import. The
drawings are well made and the directions in
general clear, although there are some re-
grettable slips in language, due perhaps to the
author's expressed intention to write very
plain, omitting unfamiliar scientific and tech-
nical terms. On the whole, the book would,
I think, have been more valuable if the author
had not been so anxious not to appear "tech-
nical." As a matter of fact, one cannot write of
a technical subject save in technical language.
Actually Mr. Vant has written in very tech-
nical language, which only an expert factory
workman of the all-round type can understand.
Need for More Men
Nevertheless I congratulate Mr. Vant heartily
on his book, and wish that more men of his
stamp and of his all-round knowledge in prac-
tical factory work were among us to-day.
Correspondence
is solicited and should be addressed to William
Braid White, 5149 Agatite avenue, Chicago.
United States Department of Labor
Developing Industrial Safety Codes
Representative of Department Confers With the American Engineering Standards Com-
mittee at Meeting in New York—Codes Applicable to Piano Industry
'117'ASHINGTON, D. C, July 11.—Ethelbert
Stewart, Commissioner of Labor Statis-
tics, returned recently from New York, where
he spent' several days in conference with rep-
resentatives of the American Engineering
Standards Committee, preparing and distribut-
ing industrial safety codes. Mr. Stewart
offered many suggestions at this conference
for shortening the time required for formulat-
ing and distributing these codes. Mr. Stew-
art's report is, in part, as follows:
"The American Engineering Standards Com-
mittee is composed of the principal asso-
ciations, organizations and combinations of
manufacturers, together with organizations of
professional men, such as the American So-
ciety of Mechanical Engineers. Its work is
divided between the construction of standard
materials or technical standards and the con-
struction of safety codes. It is in this latter
field that the Department of Labor is mainly
interested.
"Whenever it is proposed to construct a
safety code for the workers in any particular
industry or in any branch of industry—or it
may be even the workers operating a particular
type of machine—The American Engineering
Standards Committee organizes the machinery
for the development of such code. A com-
mittee is named from the workmen who
operate the machines or are subject to the
hazards incident to the industry, manufacturers
who produce the machines and appliances used,
employes who use the machines in production,
Federal and State labor organizations, insur-
ance interests and qualified specialists.
"It is in the first fieid that the Department
of Labor becomes the principal agency. It is
the province of the Department of Labor to
name on these committees the men who are
best able to judge of what a safety code should
be by reason of the fact that they actually
operate these machines in the factories in
which they are employed."
The list of codes, which the Bureau of Labor
Statistics has aready published, includes the
following of particular interest to factory ex-
ecutives in the piano industry: Bulletin No.
378, Safety Code for Woodworking plants;
Bulletin No. 433, Safety Codes for the Preven-
tion of Dust Explosions, and Bulletin No. 331,
Code of Lighting Factories, Mills, etc.
Superintendents' Outing
American Steel Working
on Rust-proof Wire
to Be Held August 4
The Superintendents' Club of the New York
Piano Manufacturers' Association will hold an
outing on Thursday, August 4. at Duer's Park
and Pavilion, Whitestone Landing, L. I. E.
M. Reulbach, secretary of the club, is arrang-
ing for a large motor bus to transport most
of those making the trip from New York.
The remainder will travel to the resort in pri-
vate cars. Each superintendent will be pro-
vided with three tickets and will invite his
employer to the affair. Bathing and other
sports will be participated in and several spe-
cialties have been arranged. Full details of the
superintendents' picnic will be mailed to mem-
bers this week by the committee, which con-
sists of the following: Henry Fry, chairman,
Joseph Miller and E. M. Reulbach.
The tenth booklet on tropical woods of the
series published by Yale University School of
Forestry is now off the press and contains in-
formation on several Central American woods.
The book may be obtained from Samuel J.
Record, 205 Prospect street, New Haven, Conn.
Number of Pianos Strung With New Product
Now in Process of Investigation
Extensive experimentation with rustless
music wire is being conducted at the present
time by the American Steel & Wire Co. in
an attempt to achieve a rust-proof wire which
will conform to all of the company's standards
of tone. Several pianos have been strung with
some of the new rustless wire in a large
Eastern piano factory and others have been
equipped with this wire in the laboratory of
William Braid White, acoustic engineer of the
company, in Chicago. The results of these
tests are being carefully noted, according to
Fred Connell, general sales manager of the
music wire department of the American Steel
& Wire Co. in New York. Mr. Connell stated
that encouraging reports from both sources of
experimentation have been received.
Consult the Universal Want Directory of
The Review. In it advertisements are inserted
free of charge for men who desire positions.