Dear Fellow MMDers,  I'm continuing my excruciatingly slow way
through a rebuild of the lower action of my 1919 New York Steck
Duo-Art upright (it's number 60741).  When that is finished I will
turn my attention to the upper action, and may even speed up to a
funereal pace for that.

I've just finished working on the pedal power governor and the two
pedal pneumatics.  Two of the three pneumatics have stamped on them
"FEB 26 1917" which suggests that they were made two years before
the piano was ready.

These pneumatics are the earliest I have worked on, I think, and
pulling the old cloth off left a layer of rubber on the wooden
surfaces.  I found a good way of removing this rubber was to paint
alcohol on it -- the term is "methylated spirit" in Australia.
Petroleum based solvents had little effect.  Then water removed the
glue underneath.

The power governor had just two valves, one for each pedal pneumatic.
Under the two-valve valve chest was a two-pouch pouch board, and these
two items were glued together, with leather gaskets on both mating
surfaces.  However, on removing the gaskets, I found four empty
countersunk wood screw holes, indicating that, originally maybe, it
had been intended to screw, rather than glue, the two parts together.

In Tasmania, slotted head wood screws are getting hard to find, but
in my tin of assorted old wood screws I found four identical 8 gauge
screws, roughly 2 inches long.  I de-rusted them and now have a screwed
together power governor.

The next step will be to tackle the expression box, but there will be
an hiatus.  My wife, Beryl, has won a two-week needleworkers' cruise
around New Zealand on a humungous floating white gin palace called
"The Voyager of the Seas".  She is taking me with her, and while she
is attending her needlework classes, I'll be propping up one of the
many bars or reading detective novels -- probably more of the latter.
We sail from Sydney next Thursday.

John Phillips in Hobart, Tasmania