> From: "Roger Gable" <roger at gablepiano.com> > Date: October 8, 2010 2:54:12 PM EDT > > Nora, > I agree with Barbara and William that these pianos are not much to write home about. Hi Nora, I will respectfully disagree with this assessment. I find "pre Aeolian-American" Knabe grands to be among the better built grands of the first three decades of the 20th century. That wide tail and heavy understructure separate Knabe's from many of their inferior contemporaries. Ron N is certainly right that the bridge cap grain orientation is a problem, but that's one that can be dealt with. While my opinion is as subjective as can be, it seems to me that most of the Knabe's from that era that I have serviced, refurbished, partially rebuilt or played on gigs (without having had the opportunity to service them) can be said to "have it." The "it" to which I am referring would be, I suppose, a complex enough and potentially responsive tone that makes me want to sit and play them, even if they are in unrestored condition and have had little work beyond tuning at that point. > From: "Roger Gable" > Over the years I find one underlying negative aspect to piano rebuilding; the customer is expecting more than the technician or piano can produce. This manifests itself when the technician is expecting more than is possible through naiveté or outright deception. Roger makes an excellent and important point about expectations here. Managing customer expectations is certainly a key component of a successful restoration project at any level. The key concept here, as has been stated on this list many times, is to under-promise and over-deliver. From the moment I encounter the potential customer, I try to be as candid as possible about the limitations of the work in question. So, after a thorough evaluation of the piano, I might discuss various options and price points with the customer, starting with a total rebuild with a new board, followed by a reuse of the shimmed and epoxy-coated board with rescaling and bridge recapping and/or repair, followed by just an action rebuild with new bass strings and some board/bridge repairs. At each step down the price/complexity scale, I take great pains to point out the shortcomings of that step as compared with the more complete step above it. I take the time to enumerate the musical deficits that might be encountered with each lesser options, and I compare the cost of the rebuilding work in unfavorable terms to the cost of buying a different new or used piano in better condition. In effect, I am trying to "unsell" the work at that price point. If they choose to go ahead with the work anyway, they have been fully informed about its limitations and their expectations are probably realistic. Then, of course, while doing the work, I try my very hardest to exceed their expectations and over-deliver. As for the wisdom of "unselling" in a business where sales are crucial to our economic survival, I do think that it makes sense, in that over-promising and under-delivering can do much harm to our reputation and future ability to attract business (I'd rather not have the work if it is going to lead to an unhappy customer down the road), whereas under-promising and over-delivering can lead to very happy customers and many referrals. As a case in point, I will refer to a Knabe grand of about the size you are considering, Nora. The customers, both long time professional musicians with fine careers, chose the action rebuild with new bass strings option. Another technician had given them a highly inflated monetary value that they could expect the piano to command after a rebuild. I worked right away to deflate both that monetary value and some other expectations that they had acquired from another technician or from some other source. I worked very hard on their action, and on some on-site soundboard and bridge repairs, and had James Arledge rescale the bass. When I returned the action for regulating and voicing, I spent most of an afternoon leveling strings and voicing, during which time the clients were listening to me play with great anticipation. When I felt that the voicing was in the ballpark, I let the husband sit down and play, and he got lost in the piano for some time. When he finally stopped, he said something like "I never in my wildest dreams imagined that this piano could be anywhere near this good." Under-promise and over-deliver. And I do think that Knabe's have the goods to let you over-deliver. I apologize if this little story sounds too self-congratulatory; I certainly have many failures and problems to overcome in my work, but they are not because of over-promising. They are usually because pianos are inanimate objects that really don't care one bit about the piano technician who is pouring his/her heart and soul into them in an effort to improve them. Or, they are because of some (hopefully momentary, but you never know for sure) stupidity on my part. Less than a year later, I ran into another Knabe of similar size and age, with an action in dreadful condition. Here, the clients only had the resources for a minor amount of shop refurbishing of the action. The piano, after only several hours of work plus a tuning really sounded far better than I expected. I do think that Knabe grands are well designed in general, and typically have musical potential. There are some scaling problems in the tenor of some of the largest ones, but that won't pertain to the one you are considering rebuilding. As for specific problems to watch out for in rebuilding Knabe grands, in addition to the bridge cap grain orientation that has been mentioned, look carefully at the counterbearing angles between the tuning pin and the front termination (agraffe or capo). Sometimes, the bass strings practically fall down a cliff as they leave the tuning pin (here, you may want to adjust the tuning pin lean). And sometimes the treble front duplex plates are so high that string rendering can be a problem (you may want to grind the bottom of those down). I have always lived with the flattened balance rail pins; replacing 88 key buttons is challenging, and little errors can lead to big problems. Look at and consider the lyre attachment system before you make your estimate; you may want to change it to the plate system if it is dowels and pins currently, and that takes time. Sometimes, the damper heads are a little undersized (I will cheat the felt out a little past the front and back of the damper head to compensate). And you will get brownie points if you can tell us the reason for those cutouts in the inner rim that open into a cavity between the inner and outer rims (I don't know the reason). Good luck with it, Joe DeFazio Pittsburgh P.S. - all of the above only refers to the "real" Baltimore Knabe's. The Aeolian (Rochester) ones I have seen are really a different and lesser piano (though not a terrible piano by any means). -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <http://ptg.org/pipermail/pianotech.php/attachments/20101008/356fcf90/attachment.htm>
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