DC and rust

[John Pasterczyk]

Geoff,

I live about 1.5 miles from the ocean in L.A.  The
dryest my house has ever gotten was 65% R.H.  (Once
monitered and recorded 24/7 for an entire year for an
unrelated film industry project, however I found the
info quite relavent to our profession).  This, and
stories from other L.A. technicians that they have
removed more humidifiers than they've installed.  Do
you really need the humidifier?  We don't have the
bone chilling winters that cause us to turn on the
heat and dry out the house.

In my community the strings rust prematurely from the
high relative humidity, and salt content from the
ocean...my first recommendation to all new piano
owners is an Edwards String Cover...even more so than
D.C.

John Pasterczyk
Registered Piano Technician
http://www.southbaypiano.com


Forwarded Message 

Date: Fri, 22 Apr 2005 14:13:10 -0700 (GMT-07:00) 
From: "Geoff Sykes" <ivories.52@earthlink.net> 
To: pianotech@ptg.org 
Subject: DC and rust 

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Greetings all --

About a year ago I replaced an old rusted out DC
system in a clients 
grand with a complete new system and control box. The
water tank support 
rails had literally rusted away and the tank had
fallen out. Did I say 
it was old? Anyway, at the same time I also replaced
two broken strings 
up in the high treble. The entire piano was on the
rusty side and my 
guess is that age along with rust had caused these two
strings to break. 

On a return visit last weekend I found another string
up in the high 
treble had broken. I also noticed increased signs of
rust, most notably 
on the new strings I had replaced only a year ago. 

The client lives in Los Angeles about three miles from
the beach. She 
tends to be cold most of the time so the forced air
heating system runs 
a lot. While the vent in the piano room is blocked,
there is a sliding 
glass door that is infrequently open leading to the
outside. All in all 
not what I would call an environment that would be
rust promoting. 

Could the DC system be causing the rust? I'm open to
suggestions.

-- Geoff Sykes
Associate Member
Los Angeles Chapter