On Fri, Apr 17, 2009 at 8:59 AM, Leslie Bartlett <l-bartlett at sbcglobal.net>wrote: > Do you who have had troubles with this (others too) tell customers about > the significant possibility of string breakage *and* plate breakage before > starting a pitch raise? > les bartlett > Hi Les, I always mention the possibility of some strings breaking when I'm raising pitch 1/2 tone or more. I customarily inspect the piano for any back seperations, both top and bottom and check the tightness of plate screws. If I find or suspect a back seperation, if it's a minor one, I mark the ends and date them so I can check to see if it progresses, if it's a larger one, not necessarily in width but if I can insert my cleaning steel more than 3 " or so into it, I'll recommend bolting prior to tuning. I have on some of the old uprights withthe center hinge and the board glued to the top taken that off to inspect because the plate appeared to be leaning forward. I usually check first with my pocket rule to see if there are changes in depth from the edge of the board to the face of th plate, when that's possible. On a few occasions there was no seperation, on most there was. I have been very lucky(knocking wood)to have not had a plate crack while I was tuning the piano in 40 years of working on them. I have discovered them(cracks) prior to tuning. I even discovered a unique repair on one. The crack was just about in the middle of an old upright extending from the bottom upward about 5" to a point where some past tech had drilled a hole and installed a lag bolt through the plate into the lower beam. I discovered it AFTER I had tuned it when I was doing some pedal adjustment. Mike -- I intend to live forever. So far, so good. Steven Wright Michael Magness Magness Piano Service 608-786-4404 www.IFixPianos.com email mike at ifixpianos.com -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <http://ptg.org/pipermail/pianotech_ptg.org/attachments/20090417/906f8c77/attachment-0001.html>
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