US150700A - Improvement in stringing devices for piano-fortes - Google Patents

Description

H. H. MORSE.

Stringing Devices for Piano-Fortes, &c.

N0.i50,700, PaientedMayi2.i874.

C Faye., il d? il ci, ff

UNITED STATES PATENT OFFICE.

HERBERT H. MORSE, OF BRATTLEBOROUGH, VERMONT.

IMPROVEMENT IN STRINGING DEVICES FOR PIANO-FORTES, &c.

Specification forming part of Letters Patent No. 150,700, dated May 12, 1874; application filed April l, 1874.

To all whom 'it may concern.:

Beit known that I, HERBERT Il. MonsE, of Brattleborough, of the county of Vindhain and State ot' Vermont, have invented a new and useful Improvement in Mechanism for Supporting and Timing the Strings of Piano- Fortes or various other Musical Instruments; and I do hereby declare the saine to be fully described in the 'ollowin g specilication and represented in the accompanying drawings, of which- Figure l denotes a top view, Fig. 2 a side elevation, and Fig. 3 a longitudinal section, of a string and its adjuncts, to be hereinafter explained.

By 1ny invention a piano can be tuned up to concert7 or any required pitch with little danger of soon relapsing therefrom. In gen-A eral, after a piano may have been in use for a 'f'ew years it will be found diftlcnlt to keep it in tune unless it be tuned below coneertpiteh 5 but with in v means oi' sustaining and straining each. string, the chance of it continuing in tune is very much increased, it not rendered certain.

In thel drawings, the string is represented at A, it being, at or near the bridge end of it, secured to a straining-pin, B, prisinatie above the string frame or board O, as shown, and extended through a bracket, D, formed and fixed thereto. A wedge or key, o, driven into the pin-hole of the bracket serves to prevent the pin from revolving after it may have been turned sulliciently to wind the string upon it. The string goes through a hole, I), made laterally through the pin. At its opposite end the string A is secured, as shown, to a lever, E. This lever, at its inner end, is pivoted to a bridge or post, F, over and upon whose top the string extends and rests, it being, if desir able, first carried through a hook or pin, G, inserted in the string frame and near the post F. A screw, II, provided with a pyramidal head, c, goes down through the lever E and screws into the string-frame, the shonl.A der of the head resting on the lever. The lever and the screw serve as a means of tuning the string. By the pin B the string may be rst set up or strained approximately to the right pitch, after which the wedge is to be driven by the side of the pin. and into its hole in the bracket, the wedge serving to prevent the pin from revolving' in the bracket.

By applying a tuning-key to 'the head of the screw II and turning it, the lever E may be depressed very gradually until the string may be brought to the correct pitch.

Instead of the bracket, the wedge, and the straining-pin B, a common hitch-pin may be used t-o fasten the string, the post F, the lever E, and the screw II being employed to ei'ect the straining of it. I prefer, however, to have the d nplcX straining apparatus as hercinbetore described, using the lever and screw only as means of completing the strainin gof the string after it may have been partially strained by the pill B, used as described.

I claim as my invention in piano-fortes or stringed instrui'nents as follows, viz:

The rotary straining-pin B, and the bracket D and wedge a, in combination with the string A and the part F, thelever E, and the screw II, arranged with and applied to it, all substantially as specified.

HERBERT II. MORSE.

Witnesses O. F. BAILEY, WM. O. HoRToN.

Images