Pitch Raise Experiment

[Stephen Airy]

Speaking of breaking strings, I had thought of a maybe
fun, but destructive and expensive game to play. 
Every player gets supplied with a helmet and
protective suit, and a 9-foot (something as small as a
7-foot would be ok, too) grand piano with the lid
removed.  Each player is also supplied with several
sets of bass strings and tuning pins for the piano,
and a tuning lever and/or crank.  The players point
the pianos at their targets (the other players, hence
the protective clothing and helmets), install a
string, and rapidly crank it sharp until it snaps,
hopefully throwing the string out of the piano toward
their target.  The winner is the one with the most
strings left after the first person exhausts his/her
supply (unless there's a better way to determine the
winner).  Splicing a rival player's string and putting
it in your piano to use it on him is not considered
cheating.  :)

--- Clyde Hollinger <cedel@supernet.com> wrote:
> Ah, Terry!  I get weak just thinking about this,
> given my mortal fear of
> breaking strings!  This is a great experiment, I
> guess, but I'm glad
> nevertheless that I was a thousand miles away!  :-)
> 
> Regarding your last paragraph, there's just so much
> variation from piano to
> piano.  Sure, some would take it, but others most
> definitely would not.
> 
> Regards,
> Clyde
> 
> Farrell wrote:
> 
> > This post is perhaps most directed toward those
> having questions regarding
> > the feasibility of raising a one hundred year old
> very flat piano up to
> > standard pitch.
> >
> > My 12 year old son needed to do a science
> experiment and chose to
> > investigate the breaking strength of assorted
> sizes of piano strings.
> > Several sizes were installed at A4 and tightened
> until they broke, while
> > measuring pitch with the AccuTuner.
> >
> > The subject piano was a 1901 Everett grand that
> was clearly all original
> > strings and was 250 cents flat. All strings had
> quite a bit of surface
> > corrosion visible.
> >
> > The original A4 was tested first. It was brought
> up to 440 hertz, and then
> > up 100 cents, up another 100, up, up, up until it
> went to 75 cents sharp of
> > D5 before it broke! This old puppy went 560 cents
> sharp before breaking! New
> > strings were installed at the same location and
> went about 100 cents more
> > sharp before breaking.
> >
> > Believe me, I have had plenty of strings break on
> old pianos - and clearly
> > the strings on a very few old pianos will simply
> not hold the tension of
> > standard pitch. The point here is that old strings
> clearly have the
> > potential of holding standard pitch - and then
> some - and presumably many
> > will hold standard pitch just fine. I think we
> needn't be shy about
> > attempting to raise the pitch of an older (and
> otherwise sound) instrument
> > to standard pitch.
> >
> > Terry Farrell
> 
> 


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