Hey EPers,
I am refurbishing my Rhodes Stage 73 Mk I (ca. late '77/early '78) and as part of the process I am installing the Miracle Mod. I have the parts (thank you Vintage Vibe!), but have run into a problem that I couldn't resolve by looking online.
I've watched many videos online many times regarding the install of the mod, and I started as instructed: I marked where I thought the bump should go on the high E. This ended up being about an 1/8" back from the front of the pedestal. (See Pic 1; after looking at the photo, it seems that I could probably put the bump a little bit further back...) (Incidentally, there are no felts on the pedestals as my Rhodes had hammer cam felts, which I removed.)
Then I went to the low E to do the same, which is when I ran into trouble. Pretty quickly I saw that I'd have to put the bump right at the edge of the pedestal based on where the hammer was resting. Once I got in there to do it, I realized the hammer is actually resting on the bump itself when the key is depressed (See Pic 2.) (I was always careful to make sure I was never going into aftertouch throughout this process). This is problematic, no? My understanding is that the bump should not be touching (or at most only barely touching) the hammer when the key is depressed. As you can (hopefully) see in the photo, the cam is not only touching the bump, but it's SITTING on the bump, consequently raising it above the pedestal, as evidenced by the light coming from behind.
I decided to check another key to see if there was a difference, and it seemed like the hammer cams were getting further and further away from the edge of the pedestal as I went up the keyboard. After some trial and error, I found that the low Eb--nearly an octave up from the lowest key--was the lowest key I could install the bump and not have it interfere with the hammer cam when the key is depressed. (See Pic 3; sorry it's not the greatest shot, but it was hard to get at.)
To confirm this discrepancy, you can compare the position of the BACK of the hammer cams to the back of the pedestals between Pics 1 & 2: you should be able to see that the cam and pedestal are flush in Pic 1, but offset by about an inch or so in Pic 2. (I'm not sure what could cause this issue--a manufacturing quirk??)
So herein lies my problem: do I make my straight edge line between the low Eb and the high E, install the bumps accordingly, and cover all the pedestals with felt? This will leave the bottom octave with felts but no bumps. This seems like it will create an escapement issue. Should I instead install the bumps on the bottom octave anyway, ignoring the interference with the hammer cam? This seems like it will also cause escapement problems.
I just want to make sure I do it right the first time (and I'm pretty anxious to get back to playing my Rhodes), so any and all feedback/thoughts are appreciated!