Wuritzer console

[Mark Kinsler]

A while ago I had a look at a Wurlizer console piano that has suffered 
through many years in an auditorium.  It is so sadly out of tune that I 
figured I could do no harm in trying out my tuning hammer on it.  It seemed 
to me that the tuning pins turned rather easily.  The condition seemed to 
exist everywhere on the pinblock, so I suspect that the pinblock is not 
cracked.

I was later told that this particular instrument goes out of tune very 
quickly and that it had been professionally tuned some months earlier.  But 
from what I've read on this list, I rather doubt that a professional tuner 
would not have attended to loose tuning pins in some way.

Nor would s/he have left one note (the first bass note left of the break, 
two wound strings) to thump the way it does.  It sounds like the strings of 
that note are touching something, but the hammer lets off normally and the 
damper lifts okay and I can't see anything stuck down there.

So I have two questions:

1) Would I wreck this instrument for all eternity if I tried some of that 
piano-tuning-pin elixir on the pinblock?  It's supposed to be great, 
according to the catalog; your tuning pin troubles will fly away like the 
bluebird on the wing.

2) What the heck might be blocking that pair of bass strings on this piano?  
I've had the various panels off and have stuck my head inside the instrument 
along with a flashlight, and there don't seem to be any dropped crayons or 
pizza boxes therein.

M Kinsler
who knows more than enough to be dangerous to both piano and mankind

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