Tightening key bushings

[Richard Brekne]

Agreed Dave

The thread started with a fellow asking what to do in case you over do 
it with key easing. I still think that if you cant "undo" the damage 
with a couple needles into the wood just behind the glue face of the 
bushing, then

    1. You definantly need to work on your easing technique, as you've 
gone way overboard
    2. If you first are way overboard... change the bushing. A single 
bushing is changed in the course of a few minutes.

The swaging tool is another one of those... << it'll do the job but dont 
expect to be able to fix'm agin >> type of tools IMHO, and it should be 
unecessary (as per punkt 1 above) to begin with :)

I dont like the steaming idea at all myself... steam means the moisture 
content in the wood will change, and that means that tommorrow the 
bushing is likely to be loose again. Ends up taking about as much time 
as it would to simply change the bushing anyways.

Cheers
RicB

Dave Nereson wrote:

>>>Also there is a special tool
>>>      
>>>
>>extant with a sort of inverted "W" on one side of the metal block. On the
>>other side it is flat. The object is to place the key, ivory down, on a
>>solid bench, insert the middle of this "W" in the bushed slot and thenbash the other side of the block. Sounds a bit crude - don't even know whether it works or not - but it's available........
>>Michael G (UK)
>>
>>    
>>
>     That's called "swaging"  the key bushing.  Yeah, it works, once, as
>someone else said.  But it's not permitted in the PTG technical exam and is
>considered a "wood butcher"-type procedure.   But as there's no regulatory
>agency for piano technicians, nobody can keep you from using it or suppliers
>from selling it.
>    --David Nereson, RPT
>
>
>  
>