Tuning stability

[Richard Brekne]

Hey there Doug !  Nice to see your name up.

Perhaps I should clarify my last in the light of  both Fred and your own 
cautions.  I said its doable, and I stand by that. But that means you 
have to afford due attention to the job to get it stable. A week in 
itself affords plenty enough time to do the deed, but you definantly 
will be using a good deal of that week getting things stable enough for 
a show. And you are going to want to pay it some extra attention in the 
following week or two as well.

As for how the tuning pins will feel.  I've done perhaps 200  
restringing jobs over the years... some using the old pins, some using 
new. I think its kind of hard to predict how they will end up feeling. 
An old block is a fickle thing. But you can guard yourself a bit if you 
are planing on using the old pins. Turn them slowly, and not more then 
just enough to get the becket out. Pre-coil your new strings with the 
appropriate tool off your choice and they will feel pretty darn much the 
same as they did to begin with.  Course... if they didnt feel good to 
begin with...then perhaps one might want to try something else :)

Cheers
RicB


Doug Wood wrote:

>I agree with Fred, here. My somewhat limited experience with restringing
>concert instruments is that they will be difficult, to put it mildly, for a
>while. Not only will the pitch be dropping, but the tuning pins feel like a
>brand-new piano (worse: they're less consistent). Tight, and ornery. It is
>possible, I think to restring the treble sections (maybe even the whole
>piano) and put it on stage the next week, but it will require a lot of
>work!!! Better to allow yourself a month or two for it to settle down at
>least some.
>
>What I find curious is that this business of the tuning pins being ornery is
>almost as bad if I restring with the same pins. (I usually do this unless
>I'm restringing the whole piano, or there is some problem with the
>pinblock.) It seems that disturbing the pinblock by only 3/4-1 turn is
>enough to unsettle them for 4-6 months. !
>
>Doug Wood
>
>On 3/29/04 6:36 AM, "Fred Sturm" <fssturm@unm.edu> wrote:
>
>  
>