Conover 88, what a day!! (long)

[David Ilvedson]

I think my blood pressure went up just reading your post...;-]

I reminds me of things I did in my youth...ah, the good old days...

David I.



On 2 Jun 2002 at 0:39, Robert Goodale wrote:

> Today was a very tiring day...
> 
> Several days ago I received a phone call from a local resident.  His
> name was Jose, and in his crude English I understood him to say that
> he had a piano in his garage and he wanted to give it away.  "Is it a
> grand piano or an upright piano?" I asked.  Having dealt with so many
> "free" junk pianos, I was very skeptical.  He indicated that it was a
> grand but didn't know much about it.  I asked him if he knew what
> brand.  He said that it was a Conover.  He could not give me any
> additional information.
> 
> I am rather fond of the Conover model "88".  It is a well built piano
> and closely resembles the Mason & Hamlin "A" in multiple aspects. 
> They have an excellent tone with a strong bass.  I was excited at the
> thought of possibly getting a free Conover "88".   When I arrived I
> was overjoyed to learn that it was indeed a model "88". Then the bomb
> fell. 
>  He wasn't looking for someone to give the piano to.  He wanted to
>  give 
> away "the parts".  Huh??????  As it turned out he was the leader of a
> salsa band.  What he really wanted was to gut the piano of the action
> and plate and then install a digital keyboard in the case.  His intent
> was to have a "grand piano look" on the stage yet something that could
> be easily broken down to move to the next gig.  Sheesh!  Here was this
> beautiful gem of a piano, certainly worthy of restoration, and all he
> wanted was to butcher it so that he could have a "grand piano look"! 
> I hesitated for a moment trying to think of something to say.  In
> desperation all I could come up with was, "I think that there could be
> other pianos more suited for your needs.  Let me see if I can come up
> with a solution for you." Then half way down the driveway it hit me. 
> I have another client, "Richard", who lives on the other side of town.
> 
> Richard is a 71 year old jazz musician who recently moved to Las Vegas
> from the Bay area.  He brought an old Wurlitzer grand with him which
> quickly deteriorated in the dry desert.  When he called me to come and
> take a look at it the pins were so loose that you could practically
> turn them by hand.  The rest of the piano reflected similar
> conditions, although the case did look fairly decent.  Richard needed
> a playable piano but had very little money to spend on one.  I
> admittedly felt a bit sorry for him, and I told him that I would keep
> an eye out for a decent cheap piano.  
> 
> So the connection was there; Jose needed a stage prop but had a 
> beautiful Conover that I wanted, and Richard had a useless grand that
> needed to be disposed.  I presented the idea to Jose.  He was hesitant
> but agreed to look at the Wurlitzer.  On my way home I called Richard.
> 
>  He agreed to the arrangement but reiterated his need for a playable
> piano.  I agreed that I would find him one if he would be a little
> patient.  Next I approached the dealer that I do PianoDisc work for. 
> I was told that "there might be something in the warehouse that could
> be salvaged".  I took the chance.
> 
> I arranged a time for Jose' to look at Richard's piano the next
> morning. 
>  Then another problem.  The following morning Richard calls me and
>  says 
> he forgot that he had an appointment.  But Jose was on his way, and I
> had no way to change the time!  Richard agreed to leave the key with
> the management of his apartment.  So Jose arrives... and the manager
> is gone!  Needless to say this did not help my relations department,
> and Jose' was becoming irritated.  Through another series of events we
> rearranged a meeting later in the day.  It finally worked, and Jose
> viewed the piano.  He seemed very unenthusiastic, and I pretty much
> gave up on the effort.  Then to my total shock, Jose calls me at 7:30
> that evening saying that he wanted the piano!  The catch of course was
> that he wanted $500.00, the amount that he supposedly paid for the
> Conover, (so he says).  I agreed.
> 
> So here's how it works:  In order to get the Conver "88" I had to
> provide Jose a substitute piano.  To do this I needed Richard's
> Wurlitzer. But in order to get the Wurlitzer I needed to get Richard a
> playable piano from the music dealer's used stash in the warehouse. 
>  Then I would have to make Richard's new piano playable and gut the
> plate and action out of his old one.  Following that I would have to
> rent a trailer to move it to Jose's house.  Then I would need to load
> up the Conover to take it to my house, all before any parties involved
> had the chance to change their mind!
> 
> I consulted Alan Meyer, my partner with whom I install PianoDiscs.  He
> will be joining me on the rebuilding shop venture and ultimately
> helping in the restoration job of the Conover 88 in question.  Early
> this morning I rented the trailer and met Alan at Richard's house.  In
> his living room we completely gutted the Wurlitzer, plate, action,
> strings and all.  This of course took two hours longer than expected,
> and I would have to inform Jose that we would be late.  Naturally I
> lost the paper with the phone number, so now I risked irritating the
> fragile agreement.  We continued the dissection of the Wurlitzer.  As
> we loaded it up we discovered that the piano would barely clear the
> roof of the trailer.  We also loaded up the plate which we now needed
> to find a place to ditch.  Suddenly I found Jose's number.  I called
> him and he was cool so off we went.
> 
> We arrived at Jose's house and unloaded the now extremely light 
> Wurlitzer case with ease and prepared to load up the Conover. 
> Surprise! 
>  Jose had already made an effort to remove the plate of the Conover
>  and 
> had loosened and/or removed all the plate bolts and screws... under
> full tension!  We quickly locked them all down again with no further
> incident.  After getting the massively heavy beast on the skid board,
> however, (he had it laying on bare concrete), it made some pretty
> awful creaking sounds, so we stopped and took the tension off the
> plate.  Next we rolled it out to the trailer only to discover that it
> was too darn tall to fit inside!  Thinking creatively we decided to
> heave the massive thing into the back of Alan's pick up.  I won't go
> into the details on how we did this, but fair it said that it was not
> fun.
> 
> To complicate matters Alan had to be at the Golden Gate casino by 4:00
> for a tuning gig involving a recording, and it was getting late.  We
> carefully and slowly made our way to my house.  Alan had to get to the
> Golden gate immediately, only this huge beast was on his little
> pick-up. 
>  We quickly unhitched the trailer from MY truck so that he could use
>  it 
> to get to his gig.  In the meantime I had to move a mountain of stuff
> in my garage to make room for the piano.  Two and a half hours later
> Alan returned.  To get the piano off the truck we needed to stack a
> huge pile of plywood up to build a ramp, (I live in a rural area and
> there are no curbs to back up to). Amazingly we managed to unload the
> thing and get it in the garage.  Whew!!!!!!!!!  What you have to go
> through to get an unplayable piano to rebuild!  Now I still have to
> get Richard a piano which I will have to make playable without charge
> to him!
> 
> Oh, I still have a Wurlitzer plate to get rid of.
> 
> 
> Rob Goodale, RPT
> Las Vegas, NV
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