Topics

Here are some of the pics i promised of my sparkle top, sorry about the quality, all i had was my blackberry to take pictures with. there are three printed numbers i can see. 2 on the hammer action, and one on the gold sticker on the harp. i still cant find one on the body anywhere.



you can see where some fool had previously mounted a power supply on the back side of the namerail...

serial # A-0186

so i picked up what i am assuming is a 65-67 sparkle top, since all of the action is wood, and have run into a couple of issues during restoration. First off and most important, what can i do about heavily grooved tear drop hammers. i have read that you can shave the top as long as they are all shaved equally and only to about 3/16ths off. i would under take this but i am already having some action issues.  
I have also had to remove the preamp that resides within the chassis, as it no longer functions due to no amp or speakers inside the suitcase... but with passive electronics and a seymour duncan pickup booster as the pre-amp i get a large amount of buzz. what can i do to remedy this, shielding the underside of the harp cover?
I also have a few dead tines, is there anything i can do to try to resurrect them as they are the early untapered raymac tines? also as these are really expensive to buy replacements for.
i picked it up for ridiculously cheep so i am not too concerned with keeping it stock, but due to the rarity of this piano i want to keep it within reason. as long as everything looks stock i am happy, but i at least want to get it playable across the entire piano before i go to far...

for those of you who own early sparkle tops what are your recommendations?