Handicraft for harmony
For the good sound of an instrument, not only the musician needs a sensitive feeling for music: Also our craftsman need their manual dexterity to produce the strings and mount them on the iron plate. At AUGUST FÖRSTERs we do have such professionals, but they can be find in other places as well – for example in the Bavarian Fichtel mountains. There, in Röslau, a manufactory produces high-quality strings made of profane steel wires, that later on are going to be processed in our workshops. Many workflows are necessary until the strings are prepared for being put onto the iron plate. 230 wrest-pins are manually hammered into the plate – up to 55 of these strings are covered with high quality copper in our manufactory. This helps the strings of the lower tones to increase their sound’s volume. The shortest string of an upright piano measures only a couple of centimeters - the longest one nearly 130, although if the rim is for example only 116 centimeters high: The strings are tensioned in an cross-over way. Besides the strings are the thicker the lower the tone is: It’s thickness varies from 0,875 up to seven millimeters – in steps of hundredth millimeters. “The Know-how of spinning a string is fundamental in building a piano”, says our experienced master piano maker Olaf Mehlich. “At the end the sound of all strings has to be in harmony - for this a lot of empirical knowledge is needed.” In fact, a professional’s hearing takes the last decision about the tuning of every single string. Does it sound as exactly as it should? Does it fit into the typical AUGUST FÖRSTER-sound? Only if criteria like these are met, we are content with it.
The strings are led over the iron plate with so called Agraffes, which allow a very precise partitioning of the string, since only a defined part of the string vibrates effectively free. There the audible tone is formed – another smaller part makes it sound with the Duplexscala, which characterizes high quality piano manufacturing. At AUGUST FÖRSTER we use it in our Grand pianos models 215 and 275 in an in-house-developed way: The string is led over a round steel for enriching the high tones with overtones. This increases the sound’s volume and ensures a good perception of the piano even in interaction with an orchestra.
If all strings are winded on the iron plate, the instrument gets tuned for the first time. This happens six times until the piano leaves our manufactory. Now for the first time plate, rim, strings and other parts are under tension. Before the further processing starts, a mature time of four weeks begins – after that continues the further process of building the instrument.