Noah, I agree with David. I had a church with a beautiful Yamaha C-7. I kept very accurate records on how many strings the SAME pianist broke. Over 110 strings were broken by him and by him alone throughout the piano. Bass, tenor and treble. Nobody else had this problem that played the piano including Anthony Burger who was a pretty hard pounder himself. Yamaha was nice enough to replace the piano for them even though they did not have to do so. After which, Yamaha had Dean Reyburn restring it for them. I still service the piano that Dean re-strung. It's been about 10 years now since then. Not one string has broken since it left that church. The new piano broke just as many strings as the old one. When the pianist tried blaming me for the problem, he ran into problems of his own. The church began believing him. I won't put up with that kind of crap at all. I wrote the church a very strong and very firm letter about who was really at fault here and sent a copy to Yamaha and to the dealership. The dealership in turn, fired off a letter back to the church re-enforcing my letter placing all of the blame on the pianist. I then immediately fired them. Who needs people like that for customers? I haven't serviced for them since. Too much blame is placed on the piano in many cases where the piano is not at fault at all. Be leery about getting in the middle. Be SURE what is causing the strings to break before saying anything at all. Jer From: pianotech-bounces at ptg.org [mailto:pianotech-bounces at ptg.org] On Behalf Of Porritt, David Sent: Thursday, July 15, 2010 2:41 PM To: pianotech at ptg.org Subject: Re: [pianotech] Appraisal Noah: I've seen pianos in churches literally destroyed by the pianist through no fault of the piano. I saw a 5 year old Mason & Hamlin that had both strings and action parts destroyed. Personally, I'd not get between the church and the store. I don't think you can help and you certainly won't make any money. dp David M. Porritt, RPT dporritt at smu.edu From: pianotech-bounces at ptg.org [mailto:pianotech-bounces at ptg.org] On Behalf Of Noah Frere Sent: Thursday, July 15, 2010 12:31 PM To: pianotech at ptg.org Subject: [pianotech] Appraisal Yesterday I recieved a call from someone representing the church piano asking me to come and look at their grand piano purchased about a year ago. There are string breakage problems and the company from whom they bought the piano has been out twice to repair broken strings, but now will no longer answer the phone, although the warranty is not yet expired. There are now 8 broken strings. They intend to sue the piano store, get the money back and purchase a different piano. They intend to use my evaluation, possibly in court, to back up their case. I see red flags. I remember attending a lecture by a tech a couple years ago about the importance of some sort of government license needed for appraisals. I am going to go read up on this matter, but if anyone has any knowledge or advice I sure would appreciate it. I only tentatively booked the appointment, and I plan on confirming, or more likely, canceling, tonight after I know more. -Noah Frere -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <http://ptg.org/pipermail/pianotech.php/attachments/20100715/35e9f0ca/attachment.htm>
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