Hi Avery, Yes I have noticed the problem, since hand reaming with "pianotech's' agraffe reamer, the problem has gone away. Looking at new agraffes with a magnifying glass, I noticed quite a few machining ridges on the surface. On old agraffes, I noted the holes were worn a little on the oval side. With rebuilds it seems to take 2-3hrs to clean up the agraffes, but it is worth the trouble. Last year I did about 6 agraffes in the field on a Heinzman grand that had some buzzy and pingy notes in the centre section. This had been a long standing complaint with the client. After removing the agraffes and reaming, put every thing back together with new wire. What a change, clean tone and definitely an increase in power and sustain. We also spray them with a coat of protec before installation, It seems to help rendering. But I may be fooling myself on that one. Roger At 08:20 AM 2/15/01 -0600, you wrote: >Jim and list, > >Have others experienced this 'ping' problem on newer pianos or rebuilt >ones with new agraffes? I never had until the last 3 yrs. or so. And >it also seems to only be on Steinway agraffes. > >Is this an agraffe problem? Is there any way to correct it short of >replacing the agraffes? One of our D's here have a few notes in the >middle and lower middle that are extremely difficult to tune. When they >ping, they always jump too far! The effect is very similar to those >snappy Baldwin tuning pins. Frustrating!!!!!!! > >Avery > >>BTW, the replacement piano for this performance was a new 'D'. >>It's still relatively "green", and coupled with the humidity swings, I >>have to jockey across agraffe pings *and* ratcheting pins to find the >>sweet spot. No doubt it will experience the same fate... just faster! >> >>Jim Harvey >> >> >>Jim Harvey >>harvey@greenwood.net >>Greenwood (n): the largest city in South Carolina WITHOUT an Interstate >
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