Here is an easy way to greatly improve the soft playing effect on
any upright player piano (especially upright Ampicos).

If your stack has fingers, remove the "at rest rail" under the
pneumatic fingers.  Prepare a metal rod with felt, a little longer than
the stack.  Slip the rod under the pneumatic fingers, in place of the
rest rail, and using a threaded rod at each end, fasten the assembly
to the hammer rail with "L" brackets.  Adjust the threaded rods to hold
the fingers to their original position with the hammer rail at rest.

What you have built is a simple lost motion compensator.  When the
hammer rail goes up, so does the stack fingers.  The fingers are always
properly adjusted to the whippens, and the jacks are always directly
under the hammer butts, regardless of hammer rail position.  This
allows the piano action to remain in regulation and repeat properly.
This has no affect on hand playing, and the keys will still drop a bit
when the rail is up.

There is also an added effect: when the hammer rail is halfway to the
strings, the span of the stack pneumatics is reduced, enhancing the
softness.  If your piano has a "split rail" (soft bass and soft treble)
make two compensating rods, and fasten them to the sub rail; otherwise,
install them on the main rail.

Try it.  I think you will like the effect.

Andy Taylor
Tempola Music Rolls

 [ The scheme Andy describes is very much like the Ampico B grand
 [ installation.  The hammer rest rail is lifted to one-half the
 [ normal strike distance, and the pneumatic push rods are similarly
 [ lifted so that there is no lost motion between the pneumatic and
 [ the key.  The pneumatic cloth at rest is very folded, and so the
 [ force is greatly reduced.  The sound intensity reduction is 8 to
 [ 10 decibels, which is quite noticeable.  -- Robbie