success with plier voicing

[David Boyce]

Hiya folks,

Just wanted to say I tried plier voicing last week for the first time, with
great success.  I was in London visiting my friend, and tuned his fiancee's
piano (I'm to be their best man on the 17th, but that's another story...). 
It's a small 1930's Challen grand (you'll know the type, Barrie) and I had
last tuned it some months ago, at which time I refaced and ironed the
hammers.  I had left the tone rather hard, to see if it would soften any by
the time I returned.  It hadn't, and I was pondering what to do since I
hadn't brought my toning needle holder, when I spotted a pair of pliers on
the floor where they'd just been used to adjust a radiator.  Well, here
goes, I thought, and gingerly squeezed a single hammer.  Surprised at the
difference this made, I quickly did the lot, and got the voicing exactly as
I wanted, in an extremely short time, compared to all the jabbing and
stabbing it would've taken with the needles.  I can quite see, however that
it would be very easy to ruin a set of hammers if one was ham-fisted.

The recent comments about squeezing knuckle splines to get them to fit were
interesting.  (Versatile tool, pliers!) Folks, what do you find to be the
most expedient way to remove the old knuckles from the shanks?

Ralph - my Boyce surname is Irish.  Clan-wise, I'm a MacGregor.  Reminds me
of a story of my mother's.  At a convention in London in the 50's, my
mother got into conversation with an American lady, who on finding out that
my mother was from Scotland said  "Oh! Scottish!  And what tribe do you
belong to?........" 

Best wishes to all.

David.
David@bouncer.force9.net