Baldwin pedal - A new piece of the puzzle

[Michelle Smith]

Hi again.  I have done some research on the Baldwin that is in need of a
pedal adjustment.  The following quote is from the tech (who wished to
remain nameless) that originally looked at the piano.

 

"This is very interesting.  The piano, a Baldwin SF10, was bought new by
[customer's name] from H&H Music, based in Houston. 

It was not in good condition and H&H asked me to "troubleshoot" the piano
and I looked at it on Jan 9, 2004.  I remember the piano and some of my
observations were that the dampers did not lift at the same time, the pedal
felt like the trapwork lever relationships were wrong, the piano was
horribly out of tune, it needed a basic regulation along with the tuning,
and also voicing.  In my opinion, none of this had been done by either the
factory or the dealer.  It is also possible, that the piano was constructed
wrong and no amount of adjustments could fix the feel of the action or
pedals.

Of course, the dealer was not happy to hear this.  I said that to do all of
that work and make the piano function would require more time than I had and
probably more money than the dealer wanted to spend, so I excused myself
from that piano without doing any work at all.  I do not know what, if
anything, the dealer did after that.  Baldwin had just gone bankrupt and
could not be trusted to participate in making the piano right.  H&H simply
wanted to preserve the sale, but I did not want to get involved in such a
big project at all.

 

I would guess that a complete action, damper, trapwork and pedal overhaul
and adjustments will have to be done.  Good luck with that. What I don't
understand, just between us, is why a music professional would buy a piano
that obviously felt that way when she tried it out, regardless of the
dealer's promises to "fix it.""

 

(end of quote)

 

I do not know what the circumstances were when the customer purchased the
piano.  Perhaps she knew that the piano needed some work.  Maybe she bought
it on sale.  I've checked the serial # and it is listed as the year 2000.  I
don't know if it was common for Baldwin or H&H to hang on to their pianos so
long.  (It wasn't purchased until 2003.) Another well-respected tech then
looked at the piano and did some extensive repining and voicing.  The pedal
remains a mystery, however.  I'm going to look at it again this Friday and
will possibly hand it over to a more experienced tech.

 

Thanks to everyone for your continued interest in this topic.

 

Michelle Smith

Bastrop, Texas 

 

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