breaky Yamaha strings

[Michael Jorgensen]

Hello,
      I have an artist client with a 1976 D in his home.   Strings break about
monthly, mostly in the sizes 15.5 and smaller.   He practices at least eight
hours daily playing all the "big works".  Anyone seriously into the Van Cliburn
Competition is probably practicing that hard.  I see this in all good makes,
Yamahas, Baldwins, Kawais, and Steinways, in practice rooms, studios, and concert
halls.  I think it's simply metal fatigue with constant use, age,  and unfiled
hammers where the strike lines are long contributes.  I suspect also that hard
fast repetition playing is partly cause.
-Mike

Benjamin Treuhaft wrote:

> this is a home piano, not a performance piano.  Steinway Concert Dept pianos
> never had this problem in the 70s when they were at their worst.  Are you
> sure this isn't Yamaha's fault?
> ----------
> >From: Bdshull@AOL.COM
> >To: pianotech@ptg.org
> >Subject: Re: breaky Yamaha strings
> >Date: Thu, May 17, 2001, 11:13 AM
> >
>
> >Ben:
> >
> >Welcome to the world of performance piano.  A 10 year old S400 which is
> >played on regularly by a budding concert pianist is sure to break plenty of
> >strings.  ANY performance piano with this type of use over several years is
> >going to.  C&A departments find that this can start to happen at the 5 year
> >point.
> >
> >Sometimes a partial treble restringing, with no tuning pin replacement, is
> >the right decision - from the first hitch pins above the bass crossover, for
> >convenience.  Usually 99% of the breakage is from C5 and up, and if the piano
> >is going to be continually used partial restringing will give it the most
> >useful life.
> >
> >Bill Shull, RPT
> >
> >In a message dated 5/17/01 7:08:34 AM Pacific Daylight Time, blt@igc.org
> >writes:
> >
> ><< What1s with Yamaha strings?  This week I replaced four adjacent #14 wires
> >on
> > a 10-year-old Yamaha 6' grand (Model S400E #4881266).
> >      The customer (a young concert pianist with long, thin, unmuscular arms)
> > has had dozens of broken strings.
> >      I called Yamaha in Los Angeles to ask if this problem is familiar to
> > them.  The technician there claimed that 1) the problem is common in all
> > makes, not just Yamaha; 2) such problems occur only in Gospel churches; 3)
> > if a concert pianist is breaking strings she has bad training;  4) it must
> > be a case of hard hammers.
> >      In 30 years of tuning I've never experienced this kind of trouble with
> > string breakage other than in Yamaha grands.   One customer, admittedly a
> > strong young pianist, broke almost all his high tenor and treble strings and
> > was going to throw the piano away (sell it wholesale to a dealer).  He is
> > Christopher Basso, the recent winner of the Van Cliburn Amateur Competition.
> >  He worked at Starbucks for a living, and didnít have a way to pay for new
> > strings.   We worked out a way to string now and pay later, and he kept the
> > instrument and won the competition, but Jesus!
> >      The S400E has the following stringing scale in the breaky sections,
> > about the same as on a Steinway:
> > #13  6
> > #13.5  4
> > #14 4
> > #14.5 5
> > #15 6
> > #15.5 6
> > #16 5
> >      Could there be something else about the scale that raises the tension
> > (maybe those strings are longer than on other grands)?   My only other
> > guesses would be 1) since all the broken strings were in the Capo D'Astro
> > section, the pressure bar somehow cuts the strings; or 2) there's something
> > breaky about Yamaha wire.
> >      Whatever the explanation, I wish Yamaha would come out and admit that
> > there's something about those otherwise excellent instruments that breaks
> > strings in the treble.   Yamaha artists are often the struggling variety,
> > and Yamaha Corporation should find a solution and fix the instruments free
> > of charge.   >>