[pianotech] Weird....strings

[Dean May]

They just made the tuning pin field too crowded in that area, sometimes it
will be poor drilling. The problem then is that it becomes impossible to get
the tension across all segments uniform, as the extra friction points
effectively introduce additional segments. Try to locate the extra friction
points, most often it is rubbing a lower tuning pin on the adjacent note.
Put your hammer on that pin and slightly bump it to relieve the tension on
the string you are trying to set. A couple iterations will usually get it
pretty close. Of course you have to go back and recheck the string on the
pin you slightly bumped. In the end, you may have to settle for a little out
of tuneness. 

Just consider it is a (choose one): spo (stupid piano object), pso (piano
shaped object), pos (piece of stupid-engineering). 

Dean

Dean W May                (812) 235-5272

PianoRebuilders.com    (888) DEAN-MAY

Terre Haute IN 47802





-----Original Message-----
From: pianotech-bounces at ptg.org [mailto:pianotech-bounces at ptg.org] On Behalf
Of Ron Nossaman
Sent: Saturday, February 05, 2011 12:01 AM
To: pianotech at ptg.org
Subject: Re: [pianotech] Weird....strings

On 2/4/2011 9:58 PM, J. W. Stein wrote:

> I wonder if the looping around 2 hitchpins is a manufacturer's fault, 
> or something has just gone awry.

It's not the hitches. It's the lousy spacing of the tuning pins so that
strings snake around a couple of them between tuning pin and pressure bar,
making it impossible to stabilize these strings. Kimballs are downright
famous for it, but you'll see it in some Baldwin verticals too, to a lesser
degree. Euthanasia is the only cure I know. I recommend explosives, or refer
them to a tuner you don't like.

Ron N