Lubricating V-bar

[Greg Newell]

David,
I have no real problem with WD-40 in small amounts but my choice of poison
is 3 in 1 oil. It does make strings render quite a bit better and remove a
great deal of frustration in tuning older pianos. I've never run into a
problem with its usage.

Greg Newell
Greg's Piano Forté
www.gregspianoforte.com
216-226-3791 (office)
216-470-8634 (mobile)

-----Original Message-----
From: pianotech-bounces at ptg.org [mailto:pianotech-bounces at ptg.org] On Behalf
Of David Boyce
Sent: Sunday, February 17, 2008 9:07 AM
To: Pianotech List
Subject: Lubricating V-bar

Yesterday evening I fitted two of JD's lovely bass strings to a customer's
piano.  Handily, they live five minutes' walk away in the next street and
are the sort of customer who presses a glass of red wine in your hand as
soon as you arrive - would that more were like that!

The two broken bass strings had broken in playing, not in tuning, at the
V-bar, which was a little rusty.

I applied a tiny amount of WD40 to each bass string at its bearing point
over the V-bar. To do this I used a watch oiler, which is just a very tiny
spatula.  My hope was to prevent any further rust at the bearing points, and
possibly break and prevent rust bonds.  Do you think WD40 was OK to use for
that?

When I had fitted the strings and the son of the family, whose piano it is
and who was home from Uni, sat down to play with the front still off, he
noticed that the windings on the old strings were the other way from on the
new ones. I thought it was just an optical illusion of the bright copper,
but on close looking, sure enough, the old strings are wound
anti-cloackwise.  A thing to watch, if they had to be unhitched and
re-hitched for any reason - very easy to put the turn on the wrong way!  But
I wonder how many customers would have spotted a thing like that!

In the pics you can see the WD40 dark smudges on the V-bar at each string
(incidentally, the pic makes it look as if the coils are not tight against
the becket, but they are).

Best regards,

David.