convincing physical plant on need for climate control

[Don Rose]

HI Gordon:

>I need some help in how to present to the director of the physical plant at
>the college where I work (Colby College in Waterville, ME) the need for
>consistency in temp. and humidity in the music building.  The music faculty
>seems to understand this.  Their primary concern is a S&S D in the
>auditorium.  Apparently the heat is lowered to 50 or 55 degrees at night,
>making my tuning efforts as permanent as ice sculpture in Death Valley.  (I'm
>told that the piano students wear coats and gloves while waiting to play in
>their rep. classes.)
>
>The tricky part of this is the phys. plant wants to save heating $$$, and the
>music dept. wants the climate controlled, but doesn't want the expense to be
>added to the music dept budget.  The piano teacher requested that I write to
>the physical plant director in my capacity as piano technician for the
>school.
>
>I am interested to know how you CAUT's have dealt with this issue.  The
>bottom line, no doubt is money.  The college can pay to have the heat kept
>up, or have the instruments serviced more often, but which budget will it
>come from?   I don't expect the plant director to know much (or care to know)
>about pianos, so I don't want to be too verbose, but I want to make a strong
>(and convincing) point.  If the pianos fall apart, the music dept. will have
>to pay to have them fixed.  Can anyone suggest how to convince the
>maintenance dept. that _they_ have an interest in preventing such damage?
>
>(I'm also trying to get the music school to have Dampp-Chasers installed)

I have had some success with building a storage area for pianos and installing humidity control
systems and electric heaters for the "storage box"--It doesn't cost a lot to heat a small area
and the piano can be kept controlled most of the time. A humidit
y control system by itself when the temperature is dropped usuallly will not help very much.
Temperature must be controlled too.

Don Rose RPT drose@maple.net