piano recommendation

[EHILBERT@midd.middlebury.edu]

> The rods may come on even though the humdity is
>below 45%, but only for a short time.  As I understand it the rods do not
>stay on all the time unless the hum. is above 90% contin occurs with a humdifier i.e. it does
not stay on all the time
>unless the hum. is below a certain amount.

Fred
This is news to me and I would appreciate a bit more information regarding
this from Dampp-Chaser......Bob Mair, any comment?
David Sanderson
Pianobiz@aol.com


My reply:
Dave, the humidifier rod will come on when the humidity is low.  If there is
no water in the bucket, or even if the wicking pads are too crusty, then the
humidifier rod acts as a heater, not a humidifier.

        Earlier this year I was called to see a Kawai KG-3D grand.  The customer
was complaining of cracks in her soundboard, despite the fact that she had a
humidifier in the room and a complete Dampp-Chaser Climate Control System
installed.  Sjhe was right on all of the above points.  However, not all was
as it appeared.

        The dampp-chaser pads were still the old cloth type.  Asked Bob Mair
and he said those pads were discontinued in the early !980's - about the time
this system was installed in the piano.  So, ten years later and they are in\
great crusty shape.  I asked when they were last changed.  As far as she knew
they had never been changed.  Her technician hadn'her they would need
it and had never done so even though the same technician has maintained it all
these years.  Here the humidifier rod was acting as a heater and drying theboard.  Oh yes, she
added water every 3 to 4 weeks in the winter!  We have to
add water to ours about every 3 or 4 days.

        And then there was that big humidifier in the corner.  She saied it
got cleaned evey summer.  Well, tive humidity
measured 27% that day and the "humidified air coming out of the humidifier"
measured a wopping 29% for a BIG 2% gain.  And this day was not nearly as
dry as we had been having for quite a while earlier this year!

        The customer wanted a new piano because of the cracks.  I said, let's
put in new DC pads, move the humidistat to a location more central than it's
present location next to the humidifier tank, and let's replace the
humidifier belt in the big humidifier.

        Surprise! less than a month later all of the cracks were fully
closed and there were no discernible rib seperations. (cracks never got that
large, thank goodness).

        Unfortunately whe wasn't happy on two accounts.
                1) She had wanted to sell it for $18,000 to her student, who
now wouldn't buy it because she had made it known the piano was defective.
(I'd love to sell a perfect 10+ year old KG-3 for that price but doubt that
I could!)
            2) She is upset because she wanted a new piano, not to be shown
that her humidity systems and her maintenace on them were the real problem.

      So the moral to all of this is to be sure that all is installed
correctly, and that all is maintained correctly.  Measuring everthing with
her there to see certainly did help.

Ed Hilbert