Rob, Great story because I believe it and I'm doing it (except with Cybertuner) *- major pitch raise, bottom to top, tuning unisons as I go, one pass.* IF there are any aural tuners out there that can to this *same - exact - major pitch raise and tuning* - in less than 90 minutes - I want to know your *exact *secrets, Duaine Rob McCall wrote: > I haven't done very many pitch raises because I'm still fairly new, > but I took some advice I received from Jer "Speedy" G about speed and > applied it to my pitch raises. I use an ETD (SAT IV) but I don't use > the overpull function (primarily because I haven't learned how to use > it yet!) but I found that I haven't needed it much. > > Here's the situation behind my first "rapid" pitch raise. My 12 year > old daughter won first place in a songwriting competition and was to > play that evening at a district-wide event. They said they had a > fairly new piano, the school was only two years old, and the piano > sounded fine. > > Wanting to make sure my daughter sounded the best she could, I decided > to stop by the school that afternoon just to check it out. I just > "happened" to have my tuning kit with me, figuring maybe a unison or > two might need some touching up. What I found was a 2007 Yamaha P22 > that hadn't been tuned since new. It was 40-70 cents flat and not a > single unison sounded good. I had less than 3 hours before the show > started. > > Since this was to make my own child look wonderful, :-) and the school > wasn't going to pay, I volunteered to donate a tuning to the school. > I loaded in the P22 page on my SAT and starting at A0, I just started > pulling up pitches and unisons as I went, using a single mute. On the > trichords, I'd mute the C and R strings, tune the L, move the mute 1 > string to the right, then match the C to the L, then I'd pull the > mute, placing it in the next C and R position, and pitch up the R > string so that it sounded close to the L and C strings I'd just tuned. > I just moved as fast as I could. > > Instead of calculating overpull, I just brought each note up to pitch, > and made the lights spin (about 2 lights/second) ever so slightly on > the sharp side using the SAT. As I got to the last 2 octaves, I tried > to get it as close to on pitch since I figured the rest of the piano > is fairly close to pitch, I surmised that I didn't need to pull the > last one's so high as most of the required tension was pulled up. > > Bottom to top, it took me 20 minutes! My previous pitch raise took me > 90 minutes. And you know what, I was much happier with this one! > When I went back to tune, I found most pitches to be within 5 cents > or less and I was able to speed through the tuning much faster. > > So, I went from a 3 hour tuning and pitch raise on my prior piano, to > having this one pitch raised and tuned in a total of 1 hour and 45 > minutes. I was very pleased. Since then, I've done 3 other pitch > raises the same way with very good results. So, while not totally > scientific, I found it to be time-saving and productive. And I think > my tunings sound better, too. > > By the way, the piano sounded beautiful to even my discriminating ear > that evening. Or maybe it's just because my daughter was playing the > piano. Either way, I was smiling! > > While tuning, I also gave out cards to about 9-10 different parents > who were helping to decorate, because they said they needed their > pianos tuned, too! Win-win for everyone!! > > Sorry for the length of my post... but this topic reminded me of my > paradigm-shifting event. > > I'll see if I can post a link to my daughters performance (which > included a mic malfunction) and maybe I can get some feedback on the > tuning. Or you can just tell this proud parent that his daughter > sounded wonderful! :-) > > Regards, And thanks "Speedy" G. :-) > > Rob McCall > McCall Piano Service, LLC > Murrieta, CA > > rob at mccallpiano.com <mailto:rob at mccallpiano.com> > www.mccallpiano.com > 951-698-1875 > -- Duaine Hechler Piano, Player Piano, Pump Organ Tuning, Servicing & Rebuilding Reed Organ Society Member Florissant, MO 63034 (314) 838-5587 dahechler at att.net www.hechlerpianoandorgan.com -- Home & Business user of Linux - 10 years
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