<HTML>In a message dated 4/26/02 12:52:43 PM Central Daylight Time, fssturm@unm.edu writes: <BLOCKQUOTE TYPE=CITE style="BORDER-LEFT: #0000ff 2px solid; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px">Excellent is 1.0, while Poor is 0.25. In other words, the 1990 version is saying (more or less) that pianos needing major rebuilding will take 4 times the work of pianos in excellent condition. (If all were excellent, 60 could be maintained by 1 fte, while if all were poor, only 15 could be maintained by 1 fte, taking this factor in isolation).    </BLOCKQUOTE> Fred One of things that is confusing to me is the use of the same words to mean different standards. For example, for Acceptable standards, "Excellent" is .7, which means one tech can take of 42 pianos. And for "Poor" the factor is 2.5, which means one tech can take care of 150 pianos. But under Condition, "Excellent" has a factor of 1.4, which means one technician can take care of 84 pianos, and "Poor," with a factor of .3, has one technician can taking care of 18 pianos. In one situation I see one technician taking care of 150 "poor" pianos, and in another situation I see one technician taking care of 18 "poor" pianos. I know the reasoning, but it is very confusing. Another factor that doesn't make sense to me is the "quality" of pianos category. The current standrds say that a piano in excellent condition is worth complete rebuilding, a good piano is worth partial rebuilding, a fair piano is worth reconditioning, and a poor piano should be replaced. This is a reasoning situation, used in IQ tests. If excellent quality is worth rebuilding, and the next level down is to do something less than completely rebuilding, and so forth, then reasoning should say that the lowest quality should need the least amount of work. If amount of work required for each lower "quality" is less and less, then a poor quality piano should only need repairing. Yet, in this case, the poor quality is doing something that should be recommended when complete rebuilding is not an option, replacing the piano. There is something wrong with this logic reasoning. The other part of that that is confusing, is that a piano "in poor condition" needs to be completely rebuilt, and a piano "of poor quality" needs to be replaced. But a piano "of excellent quality" is worth complete rebuilding, while a piano "in excellent condition" only needs regular maintenance. It's very confusing. I'm sorry Fred, I know you have spent a lot of time on this, and I appreciate all your work and effort. But the more I look at this formula, the more confusing it gets. And  tweaking the numbers and factors isn't going to make it any easier. Wim. PS. I have revived, again, my formula. It uses some of the factor in the CAUT formula, but the numbers are related to how many hours are required to do the work, including time spent doing nonproductive things like paper work, etc. If there is a request, I'll put the new version on line. </HTML>