The Voice of Inexperience

[tune4u@earthlink.net]

... calling out to the voices of real experience.

Customer has 90-year-old Chickering upright, really worn out. BUT customer
has sentimental attachment to it. So last fall she paid me to work on the
action, new damper felts, reconditioned the trapwork (quite unique), etc.

At that time, after a summer of Missouri humidity, the pin block held quite
adequately for tuning. The bass strings were of various ages, degrees of
luster, and degrees of rust--meaning that several had been replaced,
piecemeal. A couple went bang on me and have been replaced.

Some of the keys, by the way, would stick down severely at the front
rail--like the keyslip was pressing, which it wasn't. Found that roaches or
moth larvae (or something) had eaten away at the bottom of the front rail
felts. I guess they were then flexing into the pin guide hole on the key and
jamming against the bushings. Replacing the felts fixed this problem.
Interesting.

Anywho, that old pinblock had obviously been doped by someone years ago--and
they were extra messy about it. Now, after surviving the winter in a nursing
home which is kept heated to about º850 F, the bass section is too weak to
tune. Bummer.

I pounded in one pin that had a lot of collar sticking out. It helped a lot.
Most pins have nowhere to go, pounding-in wise. I used 100 grit sandpaper
shim on one that was VERY loose and it is now VERY tight (anyone with a
tuning hammer head they haven't been able to remove can bring it on over
...)

Told her the best option was probably to roll it on out to the pond, what is
technically known as the Babe Ruth treatment. You never saw such an emphatic
shaking of the head: "No!"

Okay, she's willing to pay for new wound strings (there are 65 of
them--including tri-chords on both sides of the break).

Given all the facts above: How would you proceed? What would you do? 4/0
pins? Are shims a better option when it's been doped? Open to all ideas ...

Alan Barnard
Salem, MO