About 3 years ago we published the patent drawing for the "Mathushek" action in the Journal with the following text:
The "Mathushek" Upright Action
This action is commonly found in Mathushek upright pianos, and as such is called the "Mathushek" action. The patent was obtained by Adolph Stegemann in 1885, some 14 years after Mathushek had left the New Haven Mathushek Piano Company, so it seems unlikely that Frederick Mathushek had anything to do with this action design.
This is the only "improved repetition" upright action which gained any degree of usage in the era of the upright pianos. A thin spring extends from the top of the backcheck and rides in a groove on the hammer butt. It exerts a separating force between the hammer and the wippen, allowing the jack to reset sooner.
The action can work very well, but it is hard to tell, in tests of a 120 year old piano, whether the repletion is significantly accelerated. It is clear that when properly adjusted, the action allows reset very close to the bottom of the key stroke.
Search "Stegemann" to find the patent. [My patent drawing files are currently unavailable as I move to a new computer.] I have one of these pianos. The string rendering is smooth. 130 years old and no broken strings. The bass strings revived well using Bill Bremmer's cleaning technique. Abel recovered the original hammer heads. I'm still many hours away from re-assembly, but the sound given by flicking the hammers by hand is very promising.
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Ed Sutton
Editor
Piano Technicians Journal
ed440@mindspring.com 704-536-7926
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Original Message:
Sent: 10-13-2011 21:26
From: Jason Leininger
Subject: mathushek
Thanks Fred. That sure makes it easier to search. It appears that may be all the patents he filed. By the way how did that action feel? Any good? While we are talking about interesting patents, take a look at this 1864 patent by Spencer Driggs a friend of Mathushek. Sorry I have no idea how to paste the address as a link.
http://www.google.com/patents?id=gBYAAAAAEBAJ&pg=PA2&dq=spencer+driggs&hl=en&ei=UomXTqOnL8Lx0gGC0d3ZBA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=9&ved=0CEgQ6AEwCA#v=onepage&q=spencer%20driggs&f=false
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Jason Leininger
Las Vegas NM
412-874-6992
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