Pedal Harp String Spacing?

[John Leclerc]

Where can I find a string spacing template for a 40 string 2006 L & H pedal harp? Building a soundboard.
Thanks!

[charles-nix]

I’ll go out on a limb a bit–since I’m not a _pedal_ harp builder. I don’t expect you will be able to find a template–or at least one that you can use in the normal way you use a template.

Am hoping one of the pedal builders on here will correct me, but I would have thought you would taper and plane the slightly oversize soundboard (it is importantly _not_ a uniform thickness either horizontally or vertically), glue, clamp, and screw it in place, then lay out the string locations so they come exactly over the center of the natural and sharp discs, being careful that the nuts are centered in their slots first. Then the neck and column come back off and the holes are drilled through the soundboard.

I can’t see a way you could do it accurately enough otherwise and end up with a harp you can regulate–at least in a rebuilding shop setting.

I do have to ask, though: when you said that a large part of the body was cut out, I’m trying to picture what anyone was hoping to achieve.

If the structural integrity of the body was compromised at all, especially the internal butterfly braces, you will never get a soundboard to stay in the harp. The body and all its braces have to be intact to withstand the pulling force against the soundboard. The board pulls up, which pulls the body edges inward. If the edges move under the pressure, the board will pull up more, and rapidly the harp will self-destruct. The body is a lot more than just a box to hold the soundboard, and even in its intact state does not have an excess of strength for the job it has to do.

[balfour-knight]

Charles, I don’t mean to be ignorant, but where did you read about “a large part of the body was cut out, etc.” ? I don’t see that in the original post. All I see right here is: October 2, 2022 at 2:48 pm#295434REPLY
JOHN LECLERC
Participant
Where can I find a string spacing template for a 40 string 2006 L & H pedal harp? Building a soundboard.
Thanks!

“

[charles-nix]

Balfour, you’re not ignorant. I subscribe to new posts by email. I see that OP had greatly edited his post, after I answered, eliminating three long paragraphs.

The original post detailed how his son runs a music store, and someone brought the harp in to sell, and after they never came back to pick it up. The harp had a blown soundboard. He rebuilt the body where someone previously had cut a large vertical section out of the back, he presumed to reach the inside with a utility knife to cut the soundboard out. And the soundboard had been badly partly replaced with plywood. There was never any mention of any strings on the harp.

He detailed how he had, at great trouble, repaired the back of the “sound box” then finished it satin black. He said it looked pretty good, and he was now going to do the soundboard. He said it would never be a great harp, but it would play. He had called L&H, and no one could help him beyond the date of production, and now their phone is not answered–just goes to voicemail after 10 rings.

That’s a lot different from the current top post–and I have condensed and summarized the what the original had.

I was hoping that some understanding of harp structure might help OP think it through, and understand the stresses involved before he was further into a, let’s say, “challenging” project.

So I took a shot at an answer, frankly hoping that Biagio or Carl might pop up and authoritatively correct or confirm what I said.

Deleting the original post really makes my answer look silly. If I can find a copy of it, I’ll quote the original in a post, but I think I have deleted the email.

[balfour-knight]

Charles, thank you so much for your wonderful explanation. What puzzled me was that I did not see anything in the original post regarding “editing.” I wonder if it got lost in cyber space? Harp Column staff, please help!

Have a great day,
Balfour

[charles-nix]

I think it may have been a post that was deleted and a subsequent re-post.

[balfour-knight]

That surely makes sense, Charles. I remember reading about a lever harp maker who came across a badly-damaged 40-string pedal harp. (It seemed much like this one.) The lever harp maker rebuilt that pedal harp with a lever harp soundboard, and installed lever gauge strings on it. I thought that was great, because I have always wanted a 36-40 string lever harp with pedals! My Dusty FH36 would be absolutely perfect if she had pedals, even just single action.

Best regards,
Balfour

[John Leclerc]

Thanks for any info, I tried to post pictures but file size was to big, will see if I can reduce them, This is the first harp for me to work on, I spent a few weeks reading everything I could about pedal harps and construction techniques.
I know about the tremendous pulling force of a large harp and the sound box/ sound board integrity.
This harp is 64″ high, 7 pedal, the mechanical part of it works perfectly and clean as a whistle.
Not sure why someone cut the back of soundbox ??? why didn’t they remove soundboard from the front?
anyways they did make a replacement sound board , it’s made of multi layer plywood very light in color ,1/4 thick , it should be tapered, but it can’t tapered because of ply construction, , they cut it exactly to fit sound box, and they did drill 40 pilot holes, holes are offset to the left so strings will align, the hole spacing is wide at bass strings and graduate smaller all the way up, so they must have copied the original sound board, they did glue a nice veneer on top of it, and decorated it with nasty looking music notes! there is no reinforcement strip down the front/back or ribs, what’s strange is at the bottom of the soundboard there what looks like a 1.5″ wide aluminum/ metal? strip embedded in the plywood, must be for strength, don’t know how far up it goes lol.
I may buy some Sitka spruce and build a proper sound board but having 2nd thoughts.
This thing was abused pretty bad, to do it right a whole new soundbox and soundboard needs to be constructed, don’t think I can accomplish that, I don’t think its worth it.
With the price of strings( 300-500) for this harp and cost of new sound board, could be expensive and in the end a inferior harp? waste of money? I don’t know at this point, but I do enjoy fixing things!
Here’s a video if it helps.

[balfour-knight]

John, thanks for posting this video. I agree, why would someone do that to this beautiful harp? I do hope Carl or Biagio sees this and responds. Lyon and Healy could restore this harp for someone, if they bought it “as is.” Also, Tom Bell does this type of work, and of course, Carl Swanson. Everything about a harp is expensive, so I don’t know what advice I can give you. Good luck, whatever you decide!

Best wishes,
Balfour

• This reply was modified 2 years, 6 months ago by balfour-knight.

[John Leclerc]

Here it is when it arrived at the music store, you can see my son laughing, it had a weed joint wedged in at turners and dirty socks in soundbox lol, he described the 2 guys as sketchy, owner of music store ran the numbers on it to see if it was stolen, nothing came up, if the harp could only talk lol.

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[charles-nix]

Thanks for the video. Regarding the soundboard, the screws don’t hold it on–the glue does. And glue won’t stick to the putty. You will also need strips to cover the soundboard.

That soundboard will never hold the tension. My 29 string lever harp has a board with more plies. I’m not looking at it in person, but it looks to me like plain fir plywood with veneer on top–or perhaps n a shop glued up laminate with the metal laminated at the same time. In any case, it is thinner overall than the original board, and additionally only the cross grain portions of the laminate are providing any significant strength at all to the it.

If your plan is to sell for a little profit, forget it. That harp in perfect used condition sells for $7k roughly. With a blown soundboard and a damaged body, it is a parts harp, valuable only to someone with an identical harp who has a broken neck or needs an action.

That you have “restored” it makes no difference in the value–it is still a parts harp. Basically no one will buy it, if you even get it put together and get strings on it. It won’t have a warranty. You won’t have the action regulated after the board is installed. Nothing will be standard L&H. That’s just the way the harp market works. Any damaged harp, even repaired by a known professional harp shop using original equipment and techniques, sells at a discount below the regular used price. There is not likely enough margin in a small harp for even a professional shop to recover their parts and labor costs.

Think of it as a car with a salvage title. No matter what it looks like, few people will touch it. And that doesn’t even deal with the risk of its turning up on a stolen property list somewhere.

Now, doing as Balfour mentions and turning it into a light tension harp with pedals is intriguing. But using lever gut won’t save you much money on strings, and you will lose any savings in having to calculate and have custom bass strings made for the lighter tension. (And I don’t think that soundboard would even hold lever gut tension–it is only five notes lighter gauge, if I recall correctly.) That’s a fun project–but it won’t be any easier to sell and recoup your money.

[balfour-knight]

I agree with what Charles just posted. If you get this harp back together, someone might like to have it just for its “looks,” to place in a drawing/living room, even though it is not playable. On the other hand, a professional lever harp maker might like to rebuild it into a “lever harp” with pedals, like I mentioned earlier. They could use a stringing scale that they know to be good, and they would also know how to make a new soundboard to support this tension. Biagio, are you reading this? I know you could do all this! John, I am not underestimating your woodworking abilities, either. With a little help and advice from the right harp builder, I think you could pull this off and make a very usable, playable, harp too! Good luck!

All good wishes,
Balfour

[John Leclerc]

It’s weird I’ll post something and it doesn’t show up?
Tell me more about the lever harp strings, or those harps under less tension?
If so that may be the way to go?

[John Leclerc]

I did make a long post but for some reason it disappears once I submit?
Anyways I did find out who butchered this harp, its on youtube lol.
This guy was experimenting on making a floating soundboard and modified the harp I have.

[John Leclerc]

Plus the soundboard he made I have it! so weird, Stanley Chang is his name and my son said the name on the big box it came in said Chang on it.

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