Hi,  My name is Bernt Damm, I am an established restorer of player pianos
in Cape Town  and after many years of reading this group, I have a
technical question.

I have two player pianos in my workshop which require a new set of so
called 'pillow pouches' used mainly in German players and made of zephir
skin.  I have imported 10 of these skins from a company in Kansas USA and
I have manufactured a whole set of 160 pouches so far.  I have done this
before some years ago and I used normal hide-glue with excellent results
at the time.

However, this time, I noticed that after testing some of the new pouches
at a pressure of about 40", the glue joints slowly come undone, rendering
them useless.  I then noticed that the zephir skins appear slightly
fatty.  I mentioned this to the supplier who responded that the skins are
soaked in glycerine to keep them soft and pliable.  The supplier also
claims that other people use shellac to glue these skins as well as a
Pliobond cement available in USA.

I tried shellac and a whole assortment of different glues, all to no
avail.  A local adhesive manufacturer's technical support has also done
some tests on a sample of skin, again with no result.  I have relayed all
this info to the supplier of these skins but have not had a reply since.

Has anyone encountered a similar problem with these skins and if so, how
was it solved? Am I doing something wrong?  I repeat that I did not have
this problem with some other skins and their glue joints are still okay
after years, in a friend of mine's piano.  I must admit that those skins
were sourced from Germany at the time.  Can anyone help?

Sincerely,

Bernt Damm   (Cape Town, S. Africa)

 [ Editor's note:
 [
 [ Welcome to MMD, Bernt.  I think you can find help here.
 [
 [ The thread, "Celestina Rebuild", beginning in Digest 970718,
 [ discussed this problem, and it was continued under "Zephyr Skin"
 [ for a few Digests.  You can access archived copies of the digest
 [ at:   ftp://ftp.foxtail.com/pub/mechanical-music/digests
 [ or via our web site:  http://mmd.foxtail.com
 [
 [ Robbie Rhodes