Piano Firing Missiles at Church Congregation

[Billbrpt@AOL.COM]

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WOW!

Thanks for all the replies, folks.  It's nice to know how willing people are 
to help with ideas and opinions.  I know I may come off at times like a "Mr. 
know-it-all" but really, I only have superficial knowledge and experience 
with such things as manufacturing concerns, scale design, etc.  However, I 
have been around for quite a while and have heard and seen a lot.

One thing I noticed early on in my career as a piano technician was that you 
can often expect contradictory opinions on virtually any subject.  A couple 
of things that were new to me and which I had not considered were counter 
bearing angles and agraffe damage.  Also, the use of the damper pedal as a 
factor in string breakage was something I had not really heard of before.

It seems obvious to me that simply weaving some extra and tighter string 
braid would keep strings from flying out.  Some of the suggestions about 
other ways to restrain the strings seemed a bit surprising.  I had always 
thought of string braid as being principally a mute but I can see that it 
could also prevent shooting strings.

I agree that the story is comical, at least at first thought but if someone 
were to be injured, it could quickly turn to a grim scenario.  Another factor 
that I did not bring up was that I tried the best I could to get this church 
*not* to buy a piano from the particular dealer in question.  My opinion of 
Young Chang pianos completely aside, the reputation of the dealer as being 
the worst of the worst has a lot to do with whether buying any instrument at 
all from that source would be advisable.

When I visited the dealer I usually do work for, I told him of the problem 
just in case the church decides to trade the piano in.  This problem should 
definitely be known.  I can see that if the church does buy a new piano, it 
should be specially prepared in order to minimize the possibility of the 
problem occurring in a completely different instrument.  Still, the image of 
a piano coming from *that* dealer now firing scuds at the congregation is 
really funny.  They got their "good deal" and now they're paying the price 
for it.

I have not contacted Young Chang yet, I haven't been asked to do so.  The 
young lady pianist says she wants to talk to the pastor and the dealer.  She 
doesn't buy my explanation.  She thinks I "tightened the strings too much".  
She said she saw me working once and it looked to her that I was "tightening 
everything really hard".

They also haven't paid the bill for the tuning that I did now 30 days ago 
even though they had always been prompt before, sometimes even paying when I 
completed the job that day.  When I left the bill on the desk, I saw my last 
invoice sitting there marked, "Hold until next bill."  Now, there is also a 
bill for replacing two more strings and another string is on order.  
Yesterday having been Sunday, I can fully imagine that the other string of 
the unison that just broke will have broken too.  I did tell the girl that it 
was likely.  She asked why and I again explained to her that it is the way 
the piano is played and her reply was that she had a hard time accepting that.

So, that is where it stands now.  If they call someone else, I may not be 
troubled by the problem anymore but I can also see that I may be the one whom 
everyone blames for the problem.  The dealer is certainly capable of that.  
That *unequal* temperament I tune caused the problem, he might say and you 
can be sure that it will be believed.

I'll let you all know what transpires.

Bill Bremmer RPT
Madison, Wisconsin

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