TP coils

[Billbrpt]

In a message dated 4/30/98 1:34:40 PM Central Daylight Time, ilvey@a.crl.com
 writes:

<< >  it makes the coil difficult to remove later.  I believe the reason and
 the
 >  advantage for doing this however was that it created a perfect 90º bend in
 the
 >  becket (spelled according to the latest recommendation from Jim) on the
 other
 >  side which did not require a closure technique.  For this reason, it was a
 >  worthy and good practice.
 
 Of course don't do that when taking the PTG Technical Exam.  You 
 will lose a few points and it really is ugly.   >>

Thanks for mentioning that, David.  I thought of the same thing later, myself.
 It is considered incorrect and the concensus of opinion here is against it.

    I've been told that in Europe, splicing a string is thought of as
 "cobbling".   In French, they call it «bricolage».  I once examined a
 Frenchman who was taking the PTG Tuning and Technical Exams in Québec.  He
 declined to splice a string because he simply did not know the technique. (He
 still passed even though he got points off in this one area because he was
 very well versed in everything else.   His tuning Exam was very impressive.)
 He was the one that told me that it was frowned upon in Europe.  Here, of
 course, we consider that there is a time and a place for that kind of repair.

   The manufacturers of certain verticals got perfect becket closure by having
 a protruding tang at the other end of the tuning pin eye without taking any
 time to be fussy about it at all.  For them, it was a compromise that worked.
 Don't get me wrong, I hate it as much as anyone else does but there was a
 reason for doing it that way.

     Knowing this, I very occasionally use the same technique when splicing a
 string using the remaining broken off end.  There are different approaches to
 doing this.  Yat-Lam Hong always taught that one should use "normal stringing
 procedure" when splicing a string.  I can't really say that he was wrong to
 advocate this. However, there might just be a reason why I would not want to
 remove the tuning pin entirely, use a new piece of wire, make a new coil and
 redrive it.  I may well want to back it out just a bit and make a coil right
 there with what is left. Sometimes, having the protruding tang helps form a
 perfect becket and make a proper coil more easily by having a stop for the
 coil on the opposite side as Del pointed out.  

While I don't consider this proper for work on fine instruments, it may be
 useful as a temporary fix when time is critical or as a functional repair on
 an old upright, especially for one of the wound strings. "Sometimes you just
 gotta do what you gotta do when you gotta do it."  So I've heard people say.

Bill Bremmer RPT
Madison, Wisconsin