I Raise the pitch...on the pitch raise.

[barre41]

> I know I am probably in the minority here but I rarely if ever
> overpull the pitch during a pitch raise.  If the piano is way
> off, say -100 cents, I will raise to A440 on the first pass.
> My feeling is the idea of overshooting +25% of pitch
> change leaves me with a piano that I have to lower on the second
> pass and I have a phobia towards broken strings.
>
> David ilvedson, RPT
> Pacifica, CA
> Pacifica, CA

Your post brings back the memory of a tuning I did very early on. I was
working in a music store on an old upright that was about 150 cents
flat. The store was a little afraid to bring it up to pitch so I was
instructed to tune it a half step flat. This was before the Accutuner
had FAC and the expanded range so I decided to tune by offsetting the
note I was tuning on the Accutuner. Guess what? I got confused and set
the machine for the wrong note and tuned the piano in several passes a
half step sharp instead of flat. Not one single string broke and the
piano sounded very good. The piano was sold to a family where the child
was studying Suzzuki method so I had to bring the piano back down to
A-440 and the most interesting thing I noted was that the bass strings
which had been quite dead before I started, now sounded very nice.

This is not a procedure I would like to try again but I do not believe
your fears of overpulling the piano are justified. Quite often I find
that the top 1 or 2 notes on many pianos are 100 to 200 cents sharp even
though the rest of the piano has been a little flat. There are a lot of
tuners who cant hear those top notes.

I agree that if the piano is 100 cents flat, it is better it just pull
it to A-400 on the first pass because it going to take 3 passes to make
it sound right anyway. The second pass I like to use the pitch raise
calculator in the Accutuner followed by the final standard tuning. Also
I tell the customer that it should be tuned again in 3 months because
the piano will settle some due to the change of tension.

Norm Barrett