Hammer thump timing and interaction with frequency content?

These questions might belong in the thread about "micing" distance, since its related, but the first concern seems like a relatively simple edit that might make a large difference in the sound.

1. Is any experimentation being done on the timing of the hammer sound strike? My impression is that in PianoTeq the hammer sound of course comes in just a hair before the musical tone. I wonder how the sound would be affected if it came just a hair earlier, particularly on bass notes. Would the greater resistance of the thicker bass strings mean that the sound of the hammer would come ever so slightly earlier in relation to the sound of notes? Sorry if this seems too small to consider, but after playing some sample libraries with a low attack frequency on the filter envelope, but an immediate leap (attack time set to 0) to full frequency content (filter set at max, as though there were no filter, but with the filter turned on) I noticed a big difference in the sound. That negligible (should be nonexistent, given the settings) bump in sound can create a very different piano.  (Am I sinning by mentioning sample libraries--exactly what you're trying to escape?)

2. Is there an initial filtering of harmonics caused by the hammer--at the instant of contact with the string, does the string produce different harmonics for a millisecond or two from those we hear a millisecond or two later, since (1) the string is briefly divided in two, and different transwaves are spreading each way along it and (2) the sound is briefly muffled by the contact of the hammer and felt--the string is both excited and dampened simultaneously, like a man being kissed by an attractive young woman in front of his wife? And there are different amounts of "filtering" depending on the note and the velocity? On the size of the wife? And at the same time, the sound of those transwaves vibrate the soundboard and the cabinet, and are still vibrating both when the full string starts to vibrate as one oscillator and to transfer those new vibrations to them. Sorry, I'm obviously just thinking aloud, in part, and realizing again what is involved in creating a piano model...