Alan, when I was just getting started in this biz, my first job after completing Piano Technology under Jim Geiger-I worked for a tech (in the Guild btw...😏😏) - he really was kind of a "bull in a China closet so to speak! Many times I saw him CRAM/Sledge hammer in two sizes larger tuning pins than was in the piano <insert CRINGING BEETOVEN!!!😝>
And a lot of times he would dip the jumbo pins in a bit of varnish in order to help them "go in easier...🙄🙄.. and was convinced this was THE BEST technique he had found, etc. These symptoms you describe do remind me of what I experienced working for "that guy" for unfortunately nearly two years. (I was young, broke & HAD to have work!)
I'm just throwing this out there FWIW, just to say that this really COULD be a possibility. Do you have one of those little tuning pin size tools in which you can check their size in the piano?? (Schaff I believe..)
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[Kevin] [Fortenberry] [RPT]
[Staff Techician]
[Texas Tech Univ]
[Lubbock] [TX]
[8067783962]
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Original Message:
Sent: 05-29-2018 09:14
From: Alan Eder
Subject: Extreme tuning pin torque and jumpiness
No, this is not one of those "new" sports being considered for inclusion in the Olympics. I'm taking about THE highest tuning pin torques I have ever encountered, by far. When the pins DO finally release, they move a lot, with corresponding changes in the pitch of the string (and the sound of a small caliber firearm being discharged!). Did not have a torque wrench with me, or the means of shooting video of what it looks and sounds like to tune this beast (although both of these items are on the agenda for the next visit). FWIW, there were a handful of pins, scattered throughout the scale, that were far more normal feeling.
The piano is a hundred year old Steinway grand that has been restrung. Did not have time on that first visit to pull the action and examine the pinblock. In the mean time, I am left to wonder and speculate (not my favorite past-time, but in the absence of more data, it's all I have to chew on): Is it the original block, either treated with some disagreeable substance, or damaged in reaming, or restrung with too-large pins? Or could it actually be a new block, but so horribly drilled (too fast a speed and/or rate of feed? Dull bit? Too small a hole for the pin size used?), as to yield the worst feeling tuning pins I have ever encountered. It brought to mind someone describing breaking off a tuning pin (a pleasure that I have not personally had...yet) on a multi-multi-laminate Baldwin glue-block from the bad old days.
Of all the thousands of pianos I have serviced, the feeling of the tuning pins on this one are off-the-chart to an extreme degree. Do these symptoms sound familiar to anyone? And if so, were you able to positively ascertain the cause?
Thanks,
Alan
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Alan Eder, RPT
Herb Alpert School of Music
California Institute of the Arts
Valencia, CA
661.904.6483
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