Need Advice on Baldwin Hamilton Studio Upright

[John Ross]

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If you don't have the Hartt tool, you could make do with a pair of haemostats.
I usually, just use my fingers, and do by feel, in a pinch.
John M. Ross
Windsor, Nova Scotia, Canada
jrpiano@win.eastlink.ca
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Robert Finley 
  To: pianotech@ptg.org 
  Sent: Saturday, June 18, 2005 10:19 PM
  Subject: Need Advice on Baldwin Hamilton Studio Upright


  I have to tune some pianos in the practice studios of a college for a piano competition next week, and I encountered a problem with a Baldwin Hamilton studio console upright today. During the tuning I accidentally dropped a wedge mute into the action, and it rested on the hammer butts. When I tried to retrieve it I accidentally dislodged the hammer but spring which is a straight whisker-like spring that comes down vertically from a rail and presses on a felt pad on the hammer butt. It ended up sticking out at an angle. I tried to put it back on the felt pad of the hammer butt with my fingers, and then displaced an adjacent spring. There was no room to maneuver.

  Please could someone advise me what the best and easiest way would be to put the hammer butt springs back in place? I assume there is no tool I could use to grasp the springs and put them back in place? Will I have to take the action out of the piano to gain access to the springs?

  I am a learning about piano tuning and repair. This is the first problem I have encountered, so it should be good practice and experience for me.  I am concerned though that this is unfamiliar territory. I have to fix the piano and complete the tuning tomorrow so that it will be ready for the contestants. I have taken a grand piano action out before without any problems, but not a vertical one, so I am concerned whether something else more serious might become dislodged. 

  I found this Baldwion Hamilton piano difficult to work with because there was very little space to put a rubber wedge mute or felt temperament strip mute. That is why the rubber mute dropped into the action. 

  Any advice anyone can give me will be greatly appreciated. Thank you very much. 

  Robert Finley

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