<HTML> <HEAD> <TITLE>Re: [CAUT] verticals</TITLE> </HEAD> <BODY> Les, By the time you finish the cleaning, repinning, etc., your labor costs are = likely to get close to the cost of new parts.  My question always is, f= or what I have to charge, what is the customer getting?  How much longe= r are those 100-year-old hammershanks, flanges, bushings, springs, etc., goi= ng to last?  I did an action some years back where I just replaced hamm= ers, shanks, butts, and all the felt/cloth.  Now it seems that every ti= me I go back to tune it there are one or two wood pieces to repair/replace/r= eglue, and that note hasn’t played in a month or two.  It may cos= t a little more to replace everything, but when you consider what the custom= er is getting for their money, it’s a pretty easy sell.  BTW, I h= ave never found the damping to be acceptable on one of these old guys, even = with new damper felt, unless I also replaced the damper flanges & spring= s. Just one guy’s opinion, Ken Z. On 7/14/05 10:08 PM, "Leslie Bartlett" <l-bartlett@sbcglobal.n= et> wrote: <BLOCKQUOTE>How marvelous to replace all action parts, but what on earth must one charg= e for such a thing???????????   This Story and Clark is 100 years = old, and most of the action parts are still quite tight, though I will have = to do some repinning.  I'm replacing hammers, damper felts, damper leve= r felts, back rail cloth, rest rail cloth, let off button felts, cleaning ou= t all the spring grooves, springs, and lubricating the grooves. The keyboard= is being redone by Merle Sanford, and is ivory, and David Geiger is restrin= ging the piano, plugging all the tuning pin holes and redrilling.  This= is costing a bunch of bucks, and I can't imagine what one would charge for = a complete restoration. I'd sure be interested in comments from those who ha= ve vastly more experience than I.   I tried to get out of this job= , but the owner wanted me to do it, and Wim Blees finally cajoled me enough = to risk it- so I am no expert at this stuff, and normally seem to underprice= my work.    What would a "complete restoration" le= ss case work, cost in this world???????? les bartlett </BLOCKQUOTE> -- Ken Zahringer, RPT Piano Technician MU School of Music 297 Fine Arts 882-1202 cell 489-7529 </BODY> </HTML>