[pianotech] Lester Console, was Lester Spinet

[Paul T Williams]

So...the tuning cost more than the piano??? ;>)

Paul




From:
Rob McCall <rob at mccallpiano.com>
To:
pianotech at ptg.org
Date:
07/14/2010 05:59 PM
Subject:
Re: [pianotech] Lester Console, was Lester Spinet



Thanks to everyone who replied to my message. The insight I've gleaned 
from this conversation will come in handy someday.  Unfortunately, it 
wasn't today!  :-)

I arrived at the appointment and was led to a Lester piano.  But it was 
taller...  Turned out to be a console from 1946.  Had the cutout ends off 
the back of the keys and a very compact action.  It did have some plastic 
parts in an unbroken state, including the backchecks and the back end of 
the wippen, which had a capstan screw drilled through and inserted through 
the plastic and facing downward on to the back end of the key.

The problems were many, including: several loose hammer flanges, bass 
dampers that wouldn't dampen and would only raise with the key but not 
with the pedal (above the break was fine), numerous sticking keys, broken 
keytops, one broken key (E5, at the balance rail pin), etc.

When they bought the piano, they thought it was 15 years old.  They only 
missed by 49 years!

Anyway, I was going over the items with the wife and she seemed agreeable, 
but wanted to spread out the repairs for her budget. I was telling her the 
most important things that needed to be fixed, when Sergeant Husband 
walked in, overhearing our conversation, and very loudly stated, "We are 
NOT spending anymore money on this piano, I already spent $125 buying it! 
It just needs to be tuned and that'll be good enough for the kids!"

So, it got a 60-100 cent pitch raise and a tuning...  and a shy smile from 
the wife who told me to email her the list of needed repairs...  :-)

So we'll see how this goes!

Regards,

Rob McCall

McCall Piano Service, LLC
www.mccallpiano.com
Murrieta, CA
951-698-1875



On Jul 14, 2010, at 04:43 , Gerald Groot wrote:

> If you're lucky, the previous tuner replaced them with wooden elbow's. I
> remember about 30 years ago, Yat Lam Hong asking me what I used to 
replace
> elbow's.  My answer?  Clip on plastic elbows.  I thought it was the 
norm.
> His response?  "Why you use plastic to replace plastic?  Why not use 
wood?
> Won't break."  Logical response.  Since then, that's what I've done. 
He's
> right.  Sometimes the clip ons break again, especially years later. 
Wooden
> ones will not. 
> 
> Jer


-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://ptg.org/pipermail/pianotech.php/attachments/20100715/9a59d22d/attachment.htm>