Re: 980927 MMDigest

I agree that they were a well-made action.  One of my mentors early
on as I learned tuning claimed that they were the best upright action
made, better than Wessell, Nickel & Gross.  It is claimed that they
are the fastest- repeating upright action.  The hammer butts are
difficult to remove in the event a broken hammer shank needs
replacing, because the catcher/hammer butt combination surrounds the
flared jack.  There is one weakness which the company corrected too
late to save the design, in that the catcher center pin is under
tension from a very strong spring.  This allowed the backchecking to
be adjusted by means of a drop screw, but the bushed holes in the
butt tended to split out.  They later replaced this arrangement with
a stiff bendable wire, eliminating the breakage but sadly also the
fine regulation possibility.

Bill Maxim