Bass Bridge Epoxy Repair

[David and Jean Weiss]

Terry,

Thanks for the detailed description of this job.  One question though, did you lay the piano on its back with a piano tilter?

David Weiss
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Farrell 
  To: pianotech at ptg.org 
  Sent: Sunday, August 12, 2007 5:34 PM
  Subject: Bass Bridge Epoxy Repair


  We had a recent thread on repairing cracked bass bridges with epoxy. The question was raised on how much time a repair might take. I just completed a repair today on an old Acrosonic bass bridge.

  About five notes were affected - the treble-most notes on the bass bridge. Upon starting to tune the piano (she tunes every six years whether the piano needs it or not), I noticed the upper bass was way flat. Checked it with my Verituner and saw that the top five notes were about 30 cents flat. Looked at the bridge and saw that the speaking side bridge pins on those notes were standing up straight and a crack ran right through all the speaking pins on the top five notes. You could see that the strings had straightened out and that the cap had moved a bit.

  I removed the affected strings and the cap came right off and the pins were easy to remove. I spent about a half hour that first day.

  I came back a week later with my box of West System epoxy, their slow hardener and their High Strength/Density filler. I wet all wood mating surfaces with unthickened epoxy, then mixed in the filler to a peanut-butter consistency and applied that to all surfaces. Mooshed the cap piece in place and scraped off squeeze out. Pushed bridge pins back in with pliers. Cleaned up squeeze-out. Put a couple spring clamps on to keep all in place.

  Came back a few days later (today), put strings back on, pulled up to pitch, tuned piano.

  My on-site hourly fee is $60/hr. and I charged her $200 for the bridge repair (that included a $20 flat epoxy fee). So I guess I put a total of three hours into the repair (that included a half hour in my shop prepping (putting together a box of epoxy supplies, etc.). Plus tuning of course - so the total was $295.

  I though this was about the easiest and most straight-forward bridge repair I have ever done - usually they present some additional challenge.

  Hope this helps someone.

  Terry Farrell
  Farrell Piano

  www.farrellpiano.com
  terry at farrellpiano.com
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