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March 1

Digital Piano Keys

I seek information about how the velocity-sensitive keys work on a Kawai Digital piano Model CN33. This table describes the keys as "Responsive Hammer Compact (RH-C), Ivory Touch surface and Let-Off Simulation Escapement" but from outside the piano without doing a major disassembly I cannot tell whether the operating principle is optical, magnetic or some other. The particular problem that I want to solve is that several well used keys D₃, G₃ and Bb₃ occasionally misfire at wrong volume. Philvoids (talk) 11:32, 1 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]

That's an interesting question. The relevant article seems to be keyboard expression, but I couldn't find a very specific answer there. Shantavira|^{feed me} 12:02, 1 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]

According to this page most DPs use contact pads, though some more advanced models (e.g. the Yamaha Avant Grands) use fibre-optic sensors. There's also a video from Merriam Music that shows how some of the various Kawai actions work, which you might find helpful. The principle of contact pads is that the piano uses the difference between the times they are triggered to calculate the key velocity, and I guess they could wear out with use and need to be replaced, or it might just be that there's some dust or grit in there that could be blown away. AndrewWTaylor (talk) 13:25, 1 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]