Measuring piano hammers and modeling their interaction
Donald E. Hall, Anders G. Askenfelt · The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America · 1988
Comparison of measured piano string vibration spectra with predictions indicates that modeling the hammer with a simple mass and Hooke's law spring is not very satisfactory [Hall and Askenfelt, J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 83, 1627 (1988)]. Measurements have been made on additional hammer sets to see if values of the exponent p in a nonlinear force law F = Kξp can be connected either with hammer quality or with other aspects of piano design and history. The corresponding theory of hammer/string interaction requires solution of nonlinear equations of motion, and has previously been done only for a few isolated examples. Steps toward a flexible general computer program that can explore the dependence of string spectra upon striking parameters with nonlinear hammers will be discussed.