Steinway D strings

[Bonifield/Poulson]

Dear List Members: I have been servicing a Steinway D for a local 
classical music organization for the last nine years.  The piano, a 
beautiful 1903 Louis XIV art case instrument, was reconditioned in the 
early '80s in London and brought over here.  It was refinished, 
restrung, given new hammers, shanks, and backchecks,  and the original 
wippens refelted.  The bridge in the upper midtreble has a curved bridge 
pin line, i.e., the pins are not parallel to the line of the agraffes.  
This area has always made tunind problematical, and seems to be becoming 
more so.  I noticed this problem again yesterday, and was considering 
the possible solutions when a string broke at the V bar at D7.  I seem 
to recall a discussion in the past about the need to restring this area 
of piano in concert instruments sooner than on other pianos.  Could 
someone recap that discussion for me, as well as the problem of the 
curved bridge pin line?  It seems to me that recapping the bridge in 
this section and realigning the pins would improved the unison tuning, 
but I really don't know what the proper procedure would be to accomplish 
this.  Thanks for your input, Patrick Poulson, RPT