Tuning price

[Cy Shuster]

The reason is time, basically.

Mostly what I get are 20- to 50-year-old spinets in poor shape, or worn out 
church studios, that haven't been serviced for two to twenty years (30 is 
the record so far: a piano not tuned since new!).  I do as much as I can for 
them in two hours, which usually includes fixing the bench before I plop 
down on it, and making all the keys play (pulling out the Happy Meal toys, 
nail files, and coins).

In a typical 10-cent pitch raise, I do the fastest overpull pass I can do 
(20 min.?), then make a second full pass where I set the strings and pins, 
and then check all the unisons by ear.

With huge pitch raises, and with spinets especially, I've found that the 
tenor and treble are still way below on the second pass.  I've tried making 
three and four passes on some of them, and it seems I could sit there all 
day and not have them stabilize.

So rather than charge them for a pitch raise and fine tune, and then have to 
do it all over the next time I come out, I just do the overpull pass and 
clean up unisons (skipping the second pass, and charging just a basic tune), 
and schedule another tuning in a month or so.

But this is just based on my whopping two years of experience.  If there's a 
better way, let me know...

--Cy--

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Avery Todd" <avery1@houston.rr.com>
To: "Pianotech" <pianotech@ptg.org>
Sent: Tuesday, June 21, 2005 5:19 PM
Subject: Re: Tuning price


> Cy,
>
> I'm curious. I agree with everything else you said but.....
>
>>I do a pitch raise and fine tune on the same visit (unless it's off by 
>>more than 80 cents or so!).
>
> Why is this? I've done pitch raises of a lot more than that, even though 
> it might take
> more than two times over. Usually, assuming everything is in good shape, 
> that'll work.
> Maybe a third time in the treble! But I still want to leave it 
> "reasonably" stable.
>
> Avery