Tuning pin to tip fit?

[BSimon1234@AOL.COM]

Someone wrote:

<<important cause  (of broken pins) is a poor tuning tip-to-pin fit. 
...uniformly along the side of the pin down to the becket...Make sure your
tuning tip is firmly seated the full length of the top of the pin...etc. >>

That sounds ideal, in spite of the preference I have for slightly loose tip to
pin fit, but is that really a cause for breaking off the pin? Seems like I see
a lot of pins rounded off to some degree by tips that were too large, and I
would think that would occur first.

I carry about 12 tips in my tuning case, mostly to find one that fits fairly
well, or at least the way I want it to fit. Four are #3 tips, of which three
are from the same company, and they all fit differently. Perhaps they are
actually size 3.0,  3.25,  3.6 and 3.8 tips.  The lack of uniformity is
amazing. On the other hand, why try to get the tips more standardized, or made
to closer tolerances, when the pin tops are even less uniform from brand to
brand, maker to maker, year to year? The tuning pins do seem to be getting
better.

This bizarre tip practice, by the way,  was an accidental discovery.  I bought
out a piano shop that had well over a hundred tuning tips. I went through
them, discovering different pin fits and thread fits. I saved a really nice
assortment of tips for myself, and with valve grinding compound made the
threads all fit my different hammer heads.

Incidentally, the best tip I ever heard about tips is to clean them
occasionally. What with the dirt and varnish on many older pianos, the tips
get a build-up of stuff inside that changes fit, and affects how easy they
slip on and off pins.  The advice I heard was to boil them, which is nonsense,
but I do now and then clean the tips out with a Q-Tip and acetone or lacquer
thinner.  HEY! - I am sure some of you will try this cleaning thing,  and the
improvement shows up immediately. Let me know by e-mail what you think of the
results. I would really like to know.

Sincerely;

Bill Simon
Phoenix