has anyone ever tried this?

[Gary Fluke]

Don,

How about the UST-9?  Is that not a continuation of the UST-7?  I believe 
the UST-8 is an entirely different piano.  I have recently worked on two 
UST-5's of seventies vintage and they are fine pianos.

One of the UST-5's has a much brighter and more percussive tone than the 
other.  After filling the hammers I had to soften them considerably to get 
it to sound more like a UST normally does.  A friend of mine said the 
hammers may have been juiced by the dealer when it was new.  It is a 
one-owner piano.  Kawais in general seem to be quite consistent in tone from 
one piano to the next.

Gary Fluke
Snohomish, WA


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Don" <pianotuna at accesscomm.ca>
To: "Pianotech List" <pianotech at ptg.org>
Sent: Thursday, November 08, 2007 9:04 AM
Subject: Re: has anyone ever tried this?


> Hi Mike,
>
> Kawai pianos have very little downbearing from the strings on the bridge.
> This gives them the potential for wonderful stability. One of my favorite
> pianos is the UST-7. Would that it were still in production!
>
> At 08:59 AM 11/8/2007 -0600, you wrote:
>
>>I have been on the receiving end of this Japanese manufacturing
>>treatment. When I first began tuning for a Kawai dealer over 25 years
>>ago the entire line was made in Hamamatsu, Japan. The pianos would
>>arrive boxed, on a skid wrapped in a heavy plastic wrap, no not
>>wrapped, sealed and when opened and removed from the skid and the
>>action was untied  the piano would be in tune with itself, usually
>>about 25c sharp! It wasn't perfectly in tune, there were rough unisons
>>here and there but for the most part it was, decently, by octaves, in
>>tune. Within a week to ten days it would go out of tune depending on
>>time of year, summer/fall took a little longer. These were verticals
>>for the most part with the occasional grand.
>>My belief was that all of the pianos strung there received the
>>treatment described above and after the chipping and rough tuning were
>>fine tuned that 25c sharp to allow for stretch while they were
>>warehoused. They were then sealed in the plastic which also sealed the
>>humid air of the Japanese islands in with the piano allowing it to
>>remain sharp until opened.
>>I would "floor tune" them until sold and found that although they
>>needed the requisete 3 or 4 tunings in the first year it wasn't nearly
>>as much as the american brands I had been used to. When I returned to
>>tune them after 3 months they weren't all THAT out of tune compared to
>>Baldwins, Wurlies, Kimballs etc.
>>
>>Mike
> Regards,
> Don Rose, B.Mus., A.M.U.S., A.MUS., R.P.T.
> Non calor sed umor est qui nobis incommodat
>
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>
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