Joel Jones wrote: > > List, > > The band and choir rooms here at UM have extremely low humidity - > > 15-16% RH - lower than the rest of the building. I always knew tuning > > stability was a problem but now that I am writing down temp and RH every > > time I tune, I've realized it's not just all those bodies coming and going > > in a day. Last fall we moved an older Baldwin F into the choir room on > > which I had installed new hammer, shanks and flanges. When I tuned it in > > January the regulation - especially hammer alignment and spacing - was all > > over the place, loose screws everywhere, etc. The piano had also developed > > more false beats and seemed generally harder to tune (I mean it's already a > > Baldwin - give me a break). The Kawai it replaced was also notoriously hard > > to tune, full of false beats and unstable. > > My questions are: 1) Benefit everyone in these rooms and install > > 1-2 room humidifiers - or just try to help the pianos with Dampp-Chasers? > > 2) The piano in the band room is a Yamaha P22. It gets moved around by > > anyone and everyone regularly - the case shows it unfortunately. Is there a > > potential problem with water sloshing out of the dehumidifier bucket when it > > is moved? (I think the bucket would hang in this piano?) 3) Are the false > > beats a result of the bridges drying out and the pins getting loose? I > > tried tapping the bridge pins with a set and seating strings - it seemed to > > help some. Will the get better if the humidity level is brought up? > > Thanks for you help. > > > > Jeff Stickney, RPT > > University of Montana > > jpage@selway.umt.edu > > Whoa.... thats some low humidity readings for sure. I imagine more then one person is icthing like crasy from dried out skin. Aside from the obvious health detriments to this low a humidity level, its a guarentee of a dead piano within a few seasons. Falseness is most likely due to loose bridge pins I would think. Tapping isnt going to help a lot, certainly not in the long run. Probably the damage is more permanant and you will have to result to some kind of epoxy or CA treatment, or some more complete repair. The only real solution to this is to avoid this over dry climate to begin with. Get them Grizzlys to pump a bit of cash into a climate control system... or fix the existing one if there is one. Good luck. RicB -- Richard Brekne RPT, N.P.T.F. Bergen, Norway mailto:rbrekne@broadpark.no http://home.broadpark.no/~rbrekne/ricmain.html
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