newbie questions

[Farrell]

"For a flat piano, how flat must it be in order for it to need a pitch
raise? "

For my few non-concert tunings I do in homes of the common-folk, I charge
extra for pitch raising when the piano is somewhere between 5 & 10 cents
flat. I always (almost) tune with two passes now-a-days, so the small pitch
corrections (2 to 5 cents) come out in the first pass. If the WHOLE keyboard
is within 1 or 2 cents, I will likely do the tuning with only one pass -
depending on the client/piano.

"I discovered that it's true that if you tune a flat piano up to pitch, it
comes out flat! But I have also discovered that it gets better and better
each tuning."

Yup, and it will be right up at A440 after only 27 passes doing it that way
(just kidding ;-). That is why we do pitch raising - to reduce the number of
passes required to bring the piano up to standard pitch (or where ever).

Keep in mind also, that if the pitch varies a bunch over the whole keyboard
you will likely need some pitch "adjustment" - even when the pitch averages
out to A440. For instance - the bass is 20 cents sharp, tenor is 5 cents
flat, treble is 10 cents flat, and hi-treble is at pitch. Or sometimes, when
the piano has not been tuned for 20 years, you will have 10 or 20 cents
difference between adjacent notes (again, these are the pianos of my few
non-concert performing clients). Situations like these call for a "pitch
adjustment" pass to get the piano close to in tune so that you can proceed
to then tune it.

Terry Farrell
Piano Tuning & Service
Tampa, Florida
mfarrel2@tampabay.rr.com

----- Original Message -----
From: "Don" <drose@dlcwest.com>
To: <pianotech@ptg.org>
Sent: Tuesday, January 09, 2001 2:45 AM
Subject: Re: newbie questions


> Hi Charles,
>
> 2 cents change for a concert tuning on any note. More than that and it is
a
> pitch correction situation.
>
> An adapative overpull chart such as is used by Reyburn Cyber tuner can
give
> domestic tunings for as much as a 10 cent pitch correction. It won't be
> terribly stable but it will be useable. If A4 were ten cents flat and RCT
> was used on a "unisons as you go" basis it would probably over shoot on A4
> by about 4 cents by the time you got back to A4. Much of this pitch drop
is
> due to the metal plate flexing.
>
> At 01:05 AM 01/09/2001 -0500, you wrote:
> >3) For a flat piano, how flat must it be in order for it to need a pitch
> >raise? I discovered that it's true that if you tune a flat piano up to
> >pitch, it comes out flat! But I have also discovered that it gets better
> >and better each tuning.
> >
> >Charles Neuman
> >Plainview, NY
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
>
> Regards,
> Don Rose, B.Mus., A.M.U.S., A.MUS., R.M.T., R.P.T.
>
> Tuner for the Saskatchewan Centre of the Arts
>
> mailto:drose@dlcwest.com
> http://donrose.xoasis.com/
>
> 3004 Grant Rd.
> REGINA, SK
> S4S 5G7
> 306-352-3620 or 1-888-29t-uner
>