My first tuning attempt

[Andrew and Rebeca Anderson]

Unlike Cybertuner, Verituner (because of patent 
restrictions) can't follow results and adjust the 
overpulls for you.  I do adjust the overpull 
per-centages based on my experience with the type 
of piano in front of me.  Little uprights need 
the smallest overpull IMO.  Steinway Ds the 
biggest (36% in the high treble).  YMMV

Andrew Anderson

At 02:17 PM 1/22/2007, you wrote:
>Then there's the occasional time when the 
>Verituner suddenly jumped pitch. Measured with 
>the AccuFork first - about 8¢ flat. Then 
>measured with the Verituner - about 12¢ flat. 
>I'm thinking, oh well, maybe the battery in the 
>AccuFork is bad. First pass of a pitch raise 
>everything was set for normal, starting raising 
>pitch with standard overpull. Go back to do the 
>final pass, and the whole piano is now 4-5¢ 
>SHARP, even according to the Verituner. Grrrr.....
>
>Yes, yes, I know. It's pretty accurate on pitch 
>raises and calculating overpull...when it works. 
>But still, I don't recall ever doing an aural 
>pitch raise and having the whole piano end up 
>that sharp everywhere. It happened twice...at 
>least I noticed it twice when I thought to check 
>it with the AccuFork. On return visits to pianos 
>that I had done last with the VT, I'm noticing 
>some at A440 in the winter, when they would 
>normally be a few ¢ flat. Maybe it happened 
>quite a few times. Makes you wonder.
>
>And I never could get it to do a decent job on 
>most lesser consoles and spinets. Too flat in 
>the bass, double octaves beating 1.5 - 2 bps. 
>The ear/mind will do good work if we work at 
>training it. I had to work harder at getting the 
>VT to make it sound like my ear wanted it. So I 
>figured if I was going to have to do aural 
>checks to verify everything (every time!), might as well tune the thing by ear!
>
>Caveman John (and loving it - ugh) ;-)
>
>P.S. I'm not mad at anyone who uses an ETD. It just didn't work well for me.
>
>
>Jon Page wrote:
>>I'm with Ron K on this. Let the machine set the pitch and then check.
>>In the scheme of things, tuning-wise; the order of importance is unisons,
>>octaves, intervals (temperament).  If your unisons and octaves do not
>>sound good then it doesn't matter how well you tuned a temperament.
>>
>>Don't wear you ears down on intervals and octaves, save them for unisons.
>>The decibel level produced while tuning one 
>>pitch to another is better avoided.
>>
>>Using an ETD is not like being on auto-pilot. Eye-hand coordination takes
>>awareness and then you're right into tuning the unison by ear, not to mention
>>octave verification. It's not as though you're 
>>plugged into your Ipod playing the
>>"Mothers of Invention" while your stopping the 
>>lights or spinner, as cool as that would be :-)
>>
>>Returning to aural tuning is like anything else 
>>which you have become out of practice with,
>>maybe not as easy as getting back on a bicycle 
>>but an ETD is a great stress eliminator;
>>and that is worth the minor extra effort to re-hone your 'chops' if need be.
>>
>>But then some folks are into the whole ethereal 
>>event and wouldn't consider a power tool.