stringing

[Tom Servinsky]

There's something to be said about maintaining mental acuity during
stringing. With such a laborious, repetitive process it is very easy to get
into the automotive mode, analogous to driving with the cruise control on
too much.  I can't tell you some of the horror stories of having almost
completed the tenor section only to find out I skipped a hitch pin early on.
Major melt down!
Ron's suggestion might sound confusing to some but the bigger pictures
demonstrates the opposite. With more tasks to think about creates a higher
degree of mental alertness stringers HAVE to maintain.  It's all about
keeping your mind actively involved without getting too automated.
Obviously his suggestion also reduces extra hand tasks, which ultimately
reduces the amt. of time to string.
And speaking of missing hitch pins, I have found that the skipping of a
hitch pin is far more easier to do than missing a string change. One of
things to do do is to keep a constant awareness and count of how many hitch
pins to go. Actually putting a felt punching on the wire size changes at the
hitch pin will keep you alert on that end of the piano as well.
Tom Servinsky, RPT





You're quite welcome, sir. Aside from the obvious difference in how often
you have to swap tools and drop them on newly finished surfaces in the
stringing process, the only other concern you might want to consider is the
length of string pulled through an agraffe hole. Pre-cutting to length will
result in more cuts and a little extra time and wire waste, where threading
wire in ahead of yourself and driving two pins at once like I do means
pulling a yard or two of wire through every other agraffe hole. I expect
that will make some folks nervous. Call it a hunch. Even before I switched
to the cleaner Mapes IG, and was using "blackfinger" wire, I was never able
to determine that there was any mechanical or tonal problem with this
method. In other words, I can't see that any damage is done to the agraffe
termination by dragging that much wire through it, so that's my preference.

For what it's worth.

Ron N