Karl, That piano was a really interesting project. I gave a chapter technical on it before it was sold. The fatal parts were: Tuneability and the action. Secondary was floating and a short cut diaphraming to the bass end of the board.
1- the major fatal mistake...it was absolutely untune-able. Strings did not move up or down...every single note was a struggle. Once you got a string to render somewhat, the amount it rendered was absolutely untrustworthy, and would usually drop significantly anyway in 15 minutes. I can tune recalcitarnt pianos these days...but this one was unbelievably frustrating and sounded like s..t after fighting with it..
The problem was in how the front segment, what I'm calling the "stabilizing" length of the wire, between agraffe/capo and pin, was set up. Purchasing must have bought 200 miles of brass quarter round, and said use everywheret. So tenor string termination angles were all 40+ degrees out of the agraffe, before going over the brass counterbearing, changing angles again at a steep angle for the pin wire takeoff. As well, between brass and pin , it bore very heavily on a wide expanse of very dense felt. In the capo, again high termination angles and heavy bearing on the same felt. Capo shape was not too bad. Also i suspected the wire quality itself being somehow involved, but I can't prove that. Removing strings exhibited a flattening and actual bend, rather than a curve at the agraffe contact.
Strings were discarded. Agraffes re-profiled so only 1mm contact was in the agraffe and the rest of the agraffe hole was widened to assure undisturbed wire next to the termination. All brass counterbearing removed. Removing the brass knocked the termination angle way down. In the tenor, 3/4 or so 1mm bushing cloth on thin maple, ending up with 15 deg termination angle.
Capos, reprofiled to a V with a 0.5mm termination land. Brass counterbearing chucked, plate reground to create an upward slope for copolymer counterbearing to sit on. 12 deg termination angle.
Tuning is normal now. Capos render a little too easily, so I will probably increase termination angle with copolymer counterbearings in some situations Restrung and scaled plain wire and new bass with paullelo.
2. Action unplayable. Very heavy. Action elevations as it sat in the cavity was all wrong, and it took me a while to figure what was up. Bore way too short in relation to string height and shank elevation. Let off, very long, high resistance event despite teflon attempts on site. It just felt weird.
The weirdness was this...I have an article coming out in the next couple months and a class in Tucson called "Action Spread...what's the Hubbub". This action exhibited the major no-no I discuss in the article. That is the relationship of the jack center to the knuckle was all wrong. Action stack elevations were in what my article refers to as the fatal zone.
New WNG shanks, 16x9mm knuckle. Bacon hammers at reduced weight. Took the action stack to the bridgeport and changed the position of the whip rail, to fix the problem with jack center/knuckle core (see the article). Corrected hammer bore, custom bore to fit existing string heights. Fixed treble strike line. Redid leading. Did not need to change capstan. Regulated as if a top quality instrument.
3. The bridge cap got by me this time...It looked okay. I did not recap but repinned, and chiseled. Used pins which were a couple thousandths larger than the original. PIn fit was good, but the wood used in the cap was untrustworthy. I have no idea what it was. There is falseness, but interestingly its simliar to the falseness I find in Foeresters, with their Soviet era wood sourcing...I'm kind of liking certain amount of treble falsness these days actually. Didn't recap, because I was trying to see how far I could get work-wise, and still hit my sales price point.
It turned out to be a lovely sounding instrument. Not at all the strident mess you hear in some of these Asian instruments. Low bass and tenor were beautiful. 6ft instrument.
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Jim Ialeggio
grandpianosolutions.com
Shirley, MA
978 425-9026
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Original Message:
Sent: 02-11-2019 18:30
From: Karl Roeder
Subject: Epoxy soundboard crack repair
Mr. Ialeggio said :
It was so bad I refused to tune it...played like a truck, and completely un-tuneable. It had some fatal mistakes, but those mistakes were not structural.
Would you mind sharing what the mistakes were and how you addressed them?
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Karl Roeder
Pompano Beach FL
Original Message:
Sent: 02-08-2019 18:49
From: Jim Ialeggio
Subject: Epoxy soundboard crack repair
It would have been useful for Bill to mention the make, but I guess he didn't want to tar a manufacturer.
The fact is, like in the USofA, there were some excellent manufacturers and some not so wonderful ones. Recently I did what I called a "makeover" to what was apparently a horrible Chinese grand from 2005, a stencil piano from the Dongbei factory with a Hallet and Davis stencil on it. It was so bad I refused to tune it...played like a truck, and completely un-tuneable. It had some fatal mistakes, but those mistakes were not structural. The actual build quality of the structure, plate, board, was actually quite good. I fixed the fatal mistakes, put about 13k of work into it...no soundboard needed...and turned it into an outstanding instrument...Chinese origin not withstanding. The heavy industry part, Dongbei has down quite well...which is why I picked the instrument up as a spec instrument. Time related artisan skills, were missing, and could be fixed, along with rescaling and reconfiguring the front stabilizing lenth of wire between agraffe/capo and pin.
Sold for 15K, to the first pianist who sat down to play it...5k more than the dealer sold it for in 2005, because with the fatal errors fixed, combined with the good structure, the piano had serious musical value. Except for the Chinese origin percpetion thing, it could have sold for more.
I always look over Asian grands I service with my rebuilder's eye. There are many I would not touch, but there are also some that are worth a second look.
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Jim Ialeggio
grandpianosolutions.com
Shirley, MA
978 425-9026
Original Message:
Sent: 02-07-2019 21:38
From: Terrence Farrell
Subject: Epoxy soundboard crack repair
William B. wrote: "I think that we are starting to see the answer to the question about how well some of these Asian pianos will hold up over time compared to the pianos made in the United States."
I gather from other comments you made in your post that you are suggesting that "these Asian pianos" don't hold up over time as well as those manufactured in the USA. I find just the opposite. I routinely find 50 year old Yamahas and Kawais that are in good to very good working order. I find that it is rare to find an American-made piano of similar vintage in good condition.
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Terry Farrell
Farrell Piano Service, Inc.
Brandon, Florida
terry@farrellpiano.com
813-684-3505
Original Message:
Sent: 02-07-2019 21:25
From: William Bremmer
Subject: Epoxy soundboard crack repair
I saw the piano today. It was not my usual customer's piano. It was a friend's piano. It's basically toast. The crack was huge and look like the Grand Canyon running the length of the soundboard parallel to the bridge . I don't think there are Rebuilders out there who are putting new sound boards in 30 year old Yamaha G2 s.
I am not a Rebuilder but I did do rebuilding work for a period of 7 years back in the late 80s and early 90s. I only took pianos that had basically good soundboards but had perhaps a few minor cracks in them. I was not skilled at shimming and I didn't intend to go in that direction with my business. The epoxy repair for small cracks seemed to be appropriate and thus far, everything that I did repair that way has held up.
The kind of crack I saw was the type that usually does open and close with the change of seasons. What I don't understand is the advice about trying to get the crack closed with humidity before repairing it. What I always did was dry the board as much as I could before I repaired it.
Not knowing what I was going to see, I thought it was my customer of many years piano which was in good condition but I thought there might have been a crack that developed during this last round of very severely cold weather. As it turned out, that piano was doing fine. The people have the house humidified quite nicely and it only needed a regular tuning Plus the usual cleaning that I always do.
I thought perhaps if there was only a small crack, that I could repair it on site by loosening and parting the strings around it and filling the crack with a tinted epoxy that afterwards wouldn't draw the eye to the repair. I wouldn't have any expectation that I could make it invisible. But then again, some people who do case touch up repair can do remarkable things such as painting in Grain where a huge gouge or chip has been filled with plastic material.
When a worthy piano needs to go to a Rebuilder oh, I will be the first technician to recommend that. That being said, there are pianos that are not worth very much at all but are still useful instruments but have perhaps a particular problem that can be solved with a creative type repair. That, I am totally for doing when the situation calls for it.
The piano saw today had little-to-no market value. Doing anything at all with the crack would not have been worthwhile. I recommended having the piano cleaned out, tuned and some basic regulation, Hammer filing and Alignment be done.
I see plenty of pianos that are over 100 years old that are in better condition than the one that I saw today. It will not last beyond 50 years. I think that we are starting to see the answer to the question about how well some of these Asian pianos will hold up over time compared to the pianos made in the United States.
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William Bremmer
RPT
Madison WI
608-238-8400
Original Message:
Sent: 02-07-2019 09:23
From: John Fabel
Subject: Epoxy soundboard crack repair
First rehumdifiy the instrument, and see if crack closes back-up. Recent very cold air mass has been VERY dry. Been dealing with a spate of cracks here for the same reason. Unless the ribs have also separated from the board, and it can be determined that the crack is actually causing a problem, I would be inclined to leave it alone. If the concern is purely cosmetic, then I would tend to leave it alone, unless it simply doesnt want to close up, as repair attempts that involve adding material can be very challenging to blend in (speaking from long-time experience performing such repairs on violins and guitars). Regardless, I wouldn't attempt any repair and assessment until the instrument has been properly humidified.
Regarding epoxy, I have worked with it extensively over the years. There is a wide variety of epoxies, which can be modified in a wide variety of ways. Can be remarkably useful and effective, and can also be tricky - just like anything else, I suppose!
Hope this was helpful! John
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John Fabel
Adjunct Professor
University of Massachusetts
Amherst MA
413-695-1380
Original Message:
Sent: 02-06-2019 12:48
From: William Bremmer
Subject: Epoxy soundboard crack repair
I have a customer with a Yamaha G2 Grand about 30 years old. During the extremely cold weather recently, apparently crack appeared in the soundboard. I haven't seen it yet but will tomorrow. The customer asked in advance if I knew of someone who could repair such a crack.
I have known the customer for a long time so I know how he is sensitive to the Cosmetic aspect of this. Assuming that he agreed to have the crack repaired with wood epoxy, does anyone know if any dye or tint can be used to make the epoxy not look nearly black once it is cured? White or yellow?
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William Bremmer
RPT
Madison WI
608-238-8400
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