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Bear in mind that the circuit looks fairly simple. Its an IC op-amp with mostly resistors and a few capacitors and diodes thrown in. So its likely to be an off the shelf commodity chip and probably is still available.

They may have scratched off the IC numbering and I reckon the cable tie was also a pathetic attempt to lock things down as those chip sockets usually held the chip quite well and wouldn't need extra securing.

I would reckon if we can ID the chip, its a case of just getting a replacement and they should be fairly cheap to source. The other components are likely to be fine.  See if you can remove the cable tie and read the digit details from the chip and we an google from there.

To be fair, we kind of have to thank Michael Faraday.. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faraday_cage he came up with the idea originally

Adding shielding to the harp cover may help. There's been mention of this before with people having encountered harp covers with the inner side lined with aluminium foil. The interference is less likely with modern synths but older analog synths are noise machines and the exposed wiring in a Rhodes harp is a sucker for interference.

On the Down the Rhodes DVD, George Duke was interviewed with a metal top rhodes in the background. This could have been a stacking mod but just as easily used to shield the Rhodes from interference.

Before you do anything however, check the grounding on the harp. Use a multimeter to test continuity between the RCA ground and the pickup tangs. Then do the same for the front aluminium strip and tonebars. The harp wiring and aluminium strip etc is designed to try and ground everything. Its not a perfect solution and many have found that quite a number of tone bars may not have this grounding working. I measured about 15 of my 88 with no continuity to ground. If you find a lot of the tonebars are not grounded, then its worth reseating them after cleaning the spring and strip etc to make sure they make contact between the tonebar and strip.

If the grounding tests come out good, then next up is a ground wire to the sustain bar if one is not already there.

Finally.. try to add a shield on top of the harp by running a sheet of aluminium foil along the top of the harp under the additional keyboard. That alone might work but I'd think you will also need to run a wire from the sheet to the RCA ground. If you get somewhere with this, then the solution is to sandwich foil between two sheets of cardboard and use that as a performance shield for the interference. You could also try to line the inner cover with foil.

I've noticed no problems with mine when I stacked another modern synth. That said, a fluorescent lamp that sits about 3 feet above the piano does induce a buzz when turned on. I also once put my laptop on top and it caused lots of interference. So even when you seem to have a quiet setup, it will still induce interference if the source is strong.

Julian,
   I think what you have there is normal. They wired the top section of the 88 differently with a capacitor to reduce the clank sound from the higher range.

Same setup on my 1975 88..

I recently moved my pickups closer to try and increase the bark and dynamic range. It was already good but I wanted to see if I could improve it.

I did get a harsher bark and what i would call a more cut sound from the bass... less muddiness.

But I also got more detuning in the lower and mid registers. I was already seeing this in places on the lower register and more pronounced on the lowest range (mine is an 88 key). There was also a little detuning on the middle. But now its very pronounced there in places.

I have an E and F on the lower middle register that both end up sounding as F. Great for a bomber raid effect.

So I'm going to have to back off the pickups again and just accept the bark I already had.

I plan to try out that strobe tuner app and do some retuning also. Up to now I've been using a small chromatic tuner and a standard tuner phone app.

I'll record some samples of what I have and what I get after readjusting the problem notes. Should be able to do that this weekend. I'll post back with results.

Mine had a lot of that kind of work.. except I think they applied the lacquer with a trowel. Some of the dampers were literally solid..

If it doesn't look obvious when you lift the harp, another way to verify this is to switch the tone bar with the adjacent one on its left or right.

That way you get to test the same tone bar off a known good hammer. Likewise a good tone bar could be tested against the suspect hammer etc.

I recently ordered an Electro Harmonix Neo Clone. Won't have it for several days. But reviews were good for it. It was the same price as a Small Clone, the larger form factor. But the electronics are supposed to be the same. Plenty of demos on YouTube etc.

I also ordered two more EH stomps... an Xo Pulsar tremolo and a micro Q Tron envelope filter so some fun ahead for me.

Their shipment page does mention that they will use other shipping methods etc. I ordered stuff from them in the past and used standard airmail to Ireland. Helps avoid the Customs having a field day.

When I refitted felts and shims on my piano.. I accidentally threw them all out. The leveling was all over the place however so it felt easier to start from scratch rather than work with what was there.

But I'm fairly positive that some of the old shims felt like they were thin plastic and not paper. There may even have been some translucent. I'm not certain.

If that is the case, then would plastic ones fare better under the key pedestal than paper? Or better still, after leveling, putting one thin plastic shim over all keys might be an easier option to flipping everything around.

Anyone confirm this that there may have been plastic shims in use for this purpose.

Yeah I added the bump etc.

This piano ended up with new screws, grommets, and felts to start. Then later on it got new bridle strips and even a full set of new VV dampers. The upper section had two sets of the later damper strips instead of the original single dampers. The dampers had also been bent in all directions to cater for the overly slack bridle strips. Some were also too short to clear the pickups. So it was easier to start from scratch and restore some dignity in this regard . The only regret was re-capping the keys. If I had my time back, I'd have sanded them instead.

I never went as far as disassembling the action bar from the frame but did look it over in full. The shims are on both ends of it only and are very thin. I assume there were added to close gaps rather than have anything to do with escapement etc. There is what appears to be gaffer/material tape strip on the upper octave back rail. I left it there when I re-did the key leveling.

Good point on the block heights.. will check that when I get a chance.

Folks,
   I got a Mk1 88 stage a couple of years back and have tweaked it here to get it into playable state. I'm very happy with the results at this stage and would think I've got it as far as I probably can. The next project might be a re-tolex.

One thing I discovered along the way was that the right-hand wooden harp support block was not side-bolted into the hammer rail. So it was only secured from the frame below. It was in fact leaning about 2mm away from the hammer rail. The screw hole was there both in the block and rail. I had assumed that it may have been removed at some point and just never put back. Ironically when I removed the block from the frame, I uncovered the only date stamp on the entire piano.. "Jun 9 1975".

I replaced it with a similar thread to the screw used on the left block.

I thought little of it after that. However I recently noticed that the drill holes for the two blocks no longer align with the harp. So when I do go to refix the harp, I'll have to drill new holes. I even loosened the screw again to verify this observation.

So it's suggesting to me that it probably left the factory this way. Has anyone ever seen this before. I'm curious to know it this was just a build error or if it was deliberate. It probably ties into some of the recent threads on escapement.

You can get a glimpse of this gap here during an earlier stage of the restoration...


Here's that right side of the hammer rail showing the pre-drilled hole for the side screw...

I would unscrew the frame from the case and lift it out.

Then photograph the affected areas for all to see... make sure we can see the harp support blocks, key area etc. It may help clarify if some kind of tampering was done elsewhere to cause this over escapement.

There's a tendency for these issues to be related to the RCA area in the form of a broken connection. Bad pickups can take out sections but not usually the entire piano.

Take a look at these previous topics.. they give some good starting points such as turning the RCA plug to see if it makes a difference as its being rotated. You also need to trace the ground wiring which is run via the aluminium strips on the harp.

If you can, I'd bypass using any preamp for now and try to cable an RCA direct to an amp. This will help rule out other obstacles and keep the issue localised to the wiring.

http://ep-forum.com/smf/index.php?topic=3366.0
http://ep-forum.com/smf/index.php?topic=3529.0
http://ep-forum.com/smf/index.php?topic=2884.0

Had to lookup the Caddyshack scene...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7H22q1iDOKA

I have a hammer (half-wood '75) on my upper register that appears to stick in the same scenario. If I press the key with the damper held down, it will stick for several seconds and release.

In my case, if I lift the key back to rest position, the hammer remains up, but falls back in a few seconds. I haven't investigated it in detail yet, but I asume the hinge is a bit stiff or damaged. I'll need to remove the hammer and take a closer look at the hinge in case there's something blocking it or its damaged.

Another test, one I plan to try myself, is remove the key from the problem hammer and one adjacent to it. Then with the sustain held down to release the bridle tension, lift both hammers manually and release or just move them up and down to feel for motion differences. This may help visually highlight a stiffer hinge movement on the problem hammer.

Hi folks,
    just wanted to let you know about some new rules we have added in relation to vendors using this forum.

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We recently decided it would be best to label the accounts of all our members who are in the business of furnishing, servicing, or otherwise selling electric pianos and keyboards.

By doing this, we hope to maintain an atmosphere of respectful mutual assistance for all our members. By making it clear when a poster has a commercial interest, we aren't aiming to discount that member's opinion; rather it's a way for all our members to readily identify community contributions of our valuable members who do have commercial interests.

Most of the vendors contributing to this forum have gone far above and beyond in helping our members, and we want to honor and respect that in the way we treat vendors that serve our community.

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Regards,
    Cormac Long, Forum Admin (dresdner353)
    Rob Arnold, Moderator (Rob A)

A pre-amp with EQ is what you need then. Once you get this in the mix, you need to set the K12 input selector to Line from mic so that it can take the line signal.

The K12 will get set to some max volume level and the pre-amp used to control performance volume.

I would be suggesting something like the VV rail-mounted amp or an external pre-amp or stomp box. As mentioned earlier, I use an MXR M80 which is marketed as a DI, but its very much a preamp and its bass/mid/treble are perfect for the Rhodes frequency range. But there's a lot of cheap cack out there that will not work well. So watch out for noise levels in any reviews you read. The reviews of the M80 were very positive over it being very quiet... thats what got me interesting in trying it out.

A small mixer could also service this function of taking the passive Rhodes signal (through a mic input), adding some gain and EQ. However cheap mixers can be noisy. So if you think about this direction, try borrowing one first.

I had a cheap Alesis mixer and it broke my heart with the hiss it created. But others have noted that some of the cheap Behringer mixers can be made to work fine. The trick with a mixer is to add gain until the loudest playing hits the peak indicators on the mixers.. then pull back gain a little until the peaking stops.. you are now putting in as much signal as possible which will help drown out more of the noise. Then the performance level is controlled by the track level knob/slider or the master mixer out if no other devices are sharing the mixer. As it happens, a mixer is what is generally used with such powered speakers.

The Tramp has also had a lot of praise. Another rail-mount pre-amp is the El Potator used by forum member MrJeanPapa (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Iy1CCOAllI). This one is battery powered and has good EQ control but no tremolo.

One last point.. if you end up using a mixer or external pre-amp, try routing from the harp direct to the pre-amp/mixer, skipping the rail pots. Its often the case that the old stage pots and capacitor tend to dampen the sound too much. The pre-amp EQ can ease off the bass if its muddy.

Some videos showing a MIDI fit in action on a Mark V and then a sped up reinsertion of the keys.. but you see where the sensor rail was installed.. a little north of the guide pins.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_RqrK_3uhyU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jYNlrgADRVg

I'm using my stage at home through a mixer and set of monitors. The mixers EQ is ok but a lttle noisier than I'd tolerate. So I took a chance on an MXR M80 Bass DI.

http://www.jimdunlop.com/product/m80-bass-di

..the reviews said that it was a very quiet pre-amp and they were right.. no noise from this. It was also within my budget at the time.

My Rhodes is wired straight from the harp to the box and the bass, mid and treble EQ does a great job of giving me the tone I want. I even power mine from my mixer using the supported phantom power.

That said, I think in hind sight, I should have gone with the Vintage Vibe rail pre-amp which is based on the original circuit. So its a more authentic match to the original pre-amp and tremolo.

http://www.vintagevibe.com/p-725-stereo-vibe-stereo-tremolo.aspx

I don't know if the 54 stage rail is pre-drilled for the same number of holes.. but if it is, fitting this is very straight forward.

To get as close to the original, you are probably best looking at the Vintage Vibe stereo tremolo. Its an update of the original circuit that emulates the same cats eye waveform of the original preamps.

http://www.vintagevibe.com/p-725-stereo-vibe-stereo-tremolo.aspx

There are other preamps around but this one is specifically designed to sit in the stage or suitcase rail and act as a replacement for an original preamp.

Stevo,
   you might like this video from a recent Interview they did at Google..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M9VY3zbCt24

I had the same issue but on a much higher note (in the top octave of my 88). It would ring out after about 2 seconds and gently touching either screw or the key-side end of the tonebar with a screwdriver would get the ring to sustain longer. I was able to make that permanent with the use of a tonebar clip. But they only work for the higher range anyway.

As for grounding, AFAIK, there is no relationship to the sustain of a note, other than the electrical insulation of the circuit to help reduce noise etc.

A few that struck me recently during a random shuffle of all my albums..
Paul Simon.. Still Crazy after all these years.
Tori Amos.. her cover of I Don't Like Mondays

Does it look the first re-tolexing of this piano?

It might be interesting to hear what other kind of messages have been found by people. 

Sorry folks.. RMC/M7 discussion still off bounds. I'll have to nuke this thread later on.

Folks,
   RMC/M7 discussion etc is still off bounds.

Ben,
   this thing just keeps giving!.. 2 fantastic webisodes

There's a general attempt on the rhodes wiring to ground the tone bars, pickup tangs and sustain bar.

This is achieved on the harp with the grounded aluminum strips that run along the pickup and tone bar rows. The pickups and tone bars make contact with this in an attempt to get grounded.

If you connect a multi meter in continuity mode (with the audio beep) between the RCA ground and any tone bar or pickup tang, you should measure a connection. I think you should find all pickup tangs connected and most tone bars have a grounding. The grounding connection for the tone bar is between the strip, spring and tone bar. Sometimes that connection is not perfect.

It seems that as long as its there for most tone bars then all should be fine. If a lot of them are missing the grounding, then you do experience more buzz.

Then another thing to check is if the sustain bar is grounded. A lot of models either came wired with this extra grounding or had it retrofitted.

If you grab some alligator clip cables from an electronics shop, you could hot wire some tests by adding test grounds between the RCA and sustain, frame and maybe some of the tone bars... it might help gauge if a difference can be observed.

It is correct that nearby appliances can interfere. I have a low voltage fluorescent lamp about 3 feet above my rhodes.... if on I will pick up buzzing. Some people used to line the inside of the harp cover with foil to add extra shielding. But I reckon that most of that was the result of older analogue synths that were notorious for electronic noise.

I'd be more inclined to try to first take a direct harp signal through the m-audio to the computer to see how it works and/or sounds. To me it just seems cleaner this way. DAW fx can then pimp this out further (reverb, delay etc).

Then see about routing the fast-track line outs back to a line/low-z input on the amp if you need this for live playing etc.

In general it should be possible to take a feed from the amp.. that would allow you to chain in fx, distortion, reverb etc from the amp onto the next hop in the recording chain. Bear in mind however that the amp line out is very likely past a pre-amp stage.. lower impedance and a hotter signal. So it will need very little gain on the m-audio.

As for the rebooting.. have you tried it with the amp line disconnected.. i.e. m-audio on its own to PC.. it might be some nasty grounding issue with the amp and pc and if the m-audio on its own has no such issues, I'd stay clear of using the amp line out for fear the rebooting is the result of something a lot nastier going on which could right off the PC.

I get the feeling the impedance is the issue here and that the mic input you are using is just not up to handling the passive signal from the harp.

Trying this on the cheap, I'd say try to get a hold or loan of a cheap DI box and see if this makes a difference. An active one is likely to produce better results, but a passive one should also make some difference in gain. The high to low impedance change is also likely to make significant differences for the capture device.

My setup uses an MXR M-80 Bass DI via mixer to a cheap Behringer USB interface and I'm very happy with the clean and quiet signal I get. But this has a pre-amp which obviously you are trying to avoid here.

But I need to stress here that any device that can take the passive signal and do a better job, will be doing some kind of gain for you.. it simply will not get cleanly past A/D stage inside the PC otherwise. So you may be indadvertedly looking for a false security here when trying to get a preamp-less chain.

What is that device sitting directly on the tone bars, and why is it sitting directly on the tone bars?

That would choke the sound of those keys....

It's an Oberheim Ring Modulator
http://www.effectsdatabase.com/model/oberheim/ringmodulator

It would mute the base section.. but Joe doesn't mind that because Miroslav Vitouš is on bass.

I noticed further on 15:17 where the camera pans out a bit more, I think I can see the RCA plug extended a little.. as if connected to an adaptor.

See the image attached.. I've tried to brighten up a section of the image to highlight what I think is a return cable.

also a few minutes before this frame, I think I saw him adjust the pre-amp volume so its more than likely in use.

My 2 cents is that the harp routes direct to the ring mod and the ring-mod output connects back to the RCA cable allowing his pre-amp to still drive volume, EQ and also be used for tremolo etc if required. I assume the ring mod has a bypass mode.

While its out of view, the pre-amp RCA cable seems to hang down quite straight. That cable as we know is short and would never hang that straight on its own unless connected to something.

I've attached a screen-shot I took during the video.

Well... they can be midi enabled now.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2viDPr330O8

That kind of high-pitch noise can be common with some modern switched-mode power supplies. I've had a few devices through the years from mobile phones to PDAs that had adaptors that made those kind of noises.

Anyone know what all those knobs did or was it just a mockup?

Bear in mind, you're dealing with printer margins and PDF scaling and possibly A4/US-Letter variations. So printing off that scan is not going to be reliable. You more than likely will not have the right scale.

My piano also lacked any harp dates.

I was advised to lift the assembly out of the case and the remove the wooden harp support blocks.

The expectation was that there would be a date stamp on the frame underneath the harp support block. However instead I found one on the side of hammer rail for June 9th 1975 (see below)

So if you feel up to removing the assembly from the case, this is worth a try.

Some insight here on an older thread on the same question..

http://ep-forum.com/smf/index.php?topic=1176.0

Hollywood gets this wrong on occasion..
http://ep-forum.com/smf/index.php?topic=6324.msg31034#msg31034

That's Emiel van Rijthoven, known here as user Emielskey. He's the keyboard player for Sensual, a Dutch band (http://bandasensual.com/).

As a part of a dispute, paypal orders a buyer to destroy a violin.

I'd hate this to happen with a piano!

http://www.regretsy.com/2012/01/03/from-the-mailbag-27/

I used Take Note, A UK-based piano parts supplier to get balance rail felts, paper shims, bridle straps, action lubricant, bushing felt, a new felt strip for under the front rail and also a full set of key caps. Postage to Ireland was quite reasonable.

They also have the tools for felt bushing and tuning if you need them.

http://www.take-note.co.uk/

The pedal looks fine.. mine looks the exact same.

The leg brace bolt is definitely a DIY.. mine is a modified water valve cap. So it seems they got lost or broke quite easily. You can source replicas from Vintage Vibe and others if you want.

That PSU and pedal is fine to get. You can also go about sourcing a set of legs for it if you want to have a more authentic look. It will equally sit on a strong keyboard stand.

Given that the flanges are present, it confirms that its a stage.. meaning that a suitcase bottom is not suitable for it.

The 1979 date analysis seem accurate with the pre-amp slider layout and curve top.. its a late Mark 1 model.

Vintage Vibe have a cheek-block power supply solution that can be used to power a front rail pre-amp sans the cabinet. However AFAIK, thats a 4-pin solution only. They do list a 5-pin supply but as part of a suitcase to stage conversion kit that includes a pedal and sustain rod. I assume that this supply has the audio output jack ports built-in. Its not made clear on their site nor are any images of this shown.
http://www.vintagevibe.com/p-575-suitcase-to-stage-conversion-kit.aspx

Speak Easy have a 5-pin supply with integrated audio jacks..
http://webstore.speakeasyvintagemusic.com/power-supply-for-late-pin-rhodes-suitcase-pianos-p-110.html

Another alternative might be to source a suitable cabinet from the same 5-pin genre. That would also solve the pedal issue and in many respects help restore the piano to its original setup.

Bear in mind also that if its indeed a suitcase piano and not a stage piano, its likely to be missing the four leg flanges underneath.. check for these to at least verify that this is a suitcase piano. If you find the flanges present, then you've got a stage model with suitcase/satellite pre-amp.

IMO Its worth trying to use the front rail pre-amp. Of course you have no idea if it works or if it needs attention etc. But they are pretty good for tone shaping and the onboard tremolo and FX loop is pretty handy to have.

Just saw this new video, showing the new work shop for Vintage Vibe...
Its a true Santa Cave of all kinds of classic and new pianos, parts etc. Also some nice footage of the new VV piano harps.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FqTqhJYjxJs

Couldn't find length details anywhere.

The service manual has a cutting guide but its visual and subject to scaling when printed.

I'd be inclined to visually inspect the next tine to the left (1 semitone lower) and cut to that length if it looks like it is at a suitable length. Chances are its a safe enough estimation. The tuning spring will do the rest in increasing the pitch and you can always move the pickup to cater for the length you choose.

Afaik there were two numbering systems.

The first, which was a pre-88 system started the 73 keys from 1 to 73. When the 88 model arrived, they added 7 bass tines numbered 0 each, continued into the 73 set and then went beyond 73 up to 81. My 1975 88 stage has this layout.

Later on they started logically from 1-88, meaning the 73 starts at 8 and goes to 80 and the 88 then increases to 88. I don't know if the lower 7 tonebars of the 88 were ever numbered 1-7 or or left at 0.... reason being that physically they are the same. But the logical numbering was aligned to actual key number.

Vintage vibe recommended you clarify the piano size and physical key number counted from left to right when ordering tines. This is because of discrepancies sometimes present on the tone bars. Sometimes people even have duplicate tone bars due to the repair history etc.