radiators ruining pianos

[David Nereson]

  -----Original Message-----
  From: pianotech-bounces at ptg.org
[mailto:pianotech-bounces at ptg.org]On Behalf Of Leslie W Bartlett
  Sent: Wednesday, January 31, 2007 5:23 PM
  To: Pianotech List
  Subject: A chance to rant a bit.....


  Can any of those who've been around
awhile.....................  make some cogent comments about how
much sooner a piano with radical seasonal pitch swings will have
the pin block go bad than in a very stable environment?  I do a
school district- getting to be a drag- but they recently have
been turning all climate control off for nights, weekends, and
of course holidays.  One school having had an infestation of
mold last year, these pianos which were 5-15 cents sharp in the
fall and now up to 40 cents flat.  NO I am not that bad a tuner!
But today I tuned one of those horrible things, a GH1, and the
tuning pins were so loose I could move them easily with small
finger- and this piano is no more than five years old.    I want
to have some information for the school district in this regard.
OTOH, I tend to like a certain climate control unit which uses a
cheap cool mist humidifier, and I know that if they put these
things in a school, each will be stolen in short order.....
I've put the drying part on several pianos, but this year
because they have gone to such ridiculous lengths to dry out the
air, the bars seldom work. Instead, the pianos are impossibly
flat.

  So, thoughts would be appreciated.
  les bartlett

      I'm not saying it will, but it CAN, and has, happened on
some pianos within a year.  One of my school districts ruined a
7 foot Baldwin grand by storing it right next to the radiators
at the back of the stage -- the soundboard cracked in several
places and the pinblock dried out to the point of needing 6/0
pins or a new block.  They ended up buying a new piano and
building a special cage for it off in the wings.
      --David Nereson, RPT
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