Hello PTG community, thanks in advance for offering experience or advice regarding my following questions! This is my very first online discussion post. I have cross-listed to the CAUT forum, so apologies if you see it twice.
I am curious how to proceed with the following piano that is located at UCLA (one of the institutions where I work). This piano has fairly severe bridge cracks in the high treble section. The cracks appear to only affect the rear bridge pins. The bridge looks to be made of two pieces: a root (apparently laminated) and a cap. It was difficult to photograph the end of the bridge, but it looks to me like the crack goes through the cap and even into the root at the very edge.
The first question I asked myself was: should I attempt to do this repair? Sustain in the affected area is not bad, and tuning stability is also better than I expected given the amount of cracking. Advantages to making the bridge repair include improved tuning stability and possibly improved sustain in high treble.
Does anyone have experience repairing this kind of damage without recapping the bridge or removing the string frame (AKA plate)? If you did, I am curious:
1. How did you do it?
2. What adhesive did you use?
3. Did you remove the bridge pins or keep them in place? If you removed the bridge pins, did you fill the holes and then drill them out when the glue hardened?
I can foresee the biggest challenge in this repair being not enough space between bridge and plate to provide adequate clamping at bridge root and cap. Additionally, the wood looks very "chewed up" (the tearing of the wood has left it ragged) and I am unsure that the clamping pressure from both sides of the bridge would align all the wood splinters to their original position.
Please see attached pictures for reference, and do not hesitate to ask more questions! I will answer as I am able.
Kindest regards,
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Joshua Sadinsky
Santa Clarita CA
https://pianojosh.com/------------------------------