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<DIV><STRONG><FONT face=Arial>Talking of a big bang. One tech told me, when a
plate broke on him, a piece of the plate, went through his pant leg. Luckily, he
had loose pants on, as it would have made short work of his
leg.</FONT></STRONG></DIV>
<DIV><STRONG><FONT face=Arial>That is the story, he told me, even although, I
found it hard to believe, that it didn't get his leg.</FONT></STRONG></DIV>
<DIV>John M. Ross<BR>Windsor, Nova Scotia, Canada<BR><A
href="mailto:jrpiano@win.eastlink.ca">jrpiano@win.eastlink.ca</A></DIV>
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<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial">----- Original Message ----- </DIV>
<DIV
style="BACKGROUND: #e4e4e4; FONT: 10pt arial; font-color: black"><B>From:</B>
<A title=wimblees@aol.com href="mailto:wimblees@aol.com">Willem Blees</A>
</DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>To:</B> <A title=pianotech@ptg.org
href="mailto:pianotech@ptg.org">pianotech@ptg.org</A> </DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>Sent:</B> Sunday, October 28, 2007 12:58
AM</DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>Subject:</B> Re: Upright pinblock
question</DIV>
<DIV><BR></DIV><WBR>Terry<BR><BR>This is a classic example of the pin block
separating from the back frame of the piano. This might be one of the reasons
the piano was 140 cents flat. My advice is not to wait until the problem gets
worse. This needs to be repaired as soon as possible, or else, as Terry
described, the owners will hear a big bang in the middle of the night, if they
are lucky. The plate could also collapse when there are people in the room,
and it will not be a pretty picture. <BR><BR>There is only one proper way to
fix this, especially with a crack as big as you have, going all the way from
the bass to the treble. Take the tension off the whole piano. Remove the plate
screws at the top of the plate. Drill holes all the way through to the
back of the piano. Insert 4", (or what ever the distance is from the
front to the back of the piano), stove bolts, and tighten with washers and
nuts. (The nuts are on the back of the piano). Then take 4 or 5 C clamps, or
pipe clams, or what ever clamps you can get a hold of, and start tightening
them as much as possible. With each turn of the crack, tighten the nuts. Keep
doing this until the gap is closed. No need to put any kind of glue in the
crack, because the glue is not what is going to keep the frame and the pin
block together. <BR><BR>Keep doing this until the crack is gone, and the nuts
are tights. Then you can remove the clamps and tune the piano. This
is a big job that will take several hours. But it will be cheaper than a new
piano, and much cheaper than the medical bills after the
explosion. <BR><BR><BR>
<DIV style="CLEAR: both">Willem (Wim) Blees, RPT<BR>Piano
Tuner/Technician<BR>Honolulu, HI<BR>Author of <BR>The Business of Piano
Tuning<BR>available from Potter
Press<BR>www.pianotuning.com</DIV><BR><BR>-----Original Message-----<BR>From:
pianolover 88 <pianolover88@hotmail.com><BR>To: PIANOTECH@PTG.ORG
<pianotech@ptg.org><BR>Sent: Sat, 27 Oct 2007 4:07 pm<BR>Subject:
Upright pinblock question<BR><BR>
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Recently acquired an amazingly well preserved Kohler & Campbell art case
console made in 1969. To look at it, you would think that it could have been
made yesterday! It has <SPAN
style="TEXT-DECORATION: underline">never</SPAN> been played, thus the hammers
are unmarked after almost 40 years! Even the wooden wedge was still screwed in
securing the big panel (some call it the kick panel?) above the pedals!
<BR><BR>Anyway, the pitch was (not surprisingly) grossly flat--close to 140
cents at A4! I checked all the plate bolts and they were 90% snug, needing
maybe 1/8 turn to totally snug them back down. The tuning pins were found to
be all uniformly tight, and responded beautifully to minute, incremental
adjustments. The pitch came right up to A440 after the first pass, and after
letting it settle for a while I gave it its first tuning in nearly <SPAN
style="TEXT-DECORATION: underline">four</SPAN> decades. <BR><BR>I followed
that with two more fine tunings to make it as solid as possible for the time
being. Ok, now to get to the main reason for my post; There is, what appears
to be a separation, not really a crack but a perfectly clean separation at
least 2-3' <SPAN style="FONT-STYLE: italic">behind</SPAN> the pinblock
laminations, that runs the entire width of the pinblock. <BR><BR>As I stated
the pins are uniformly tight, the laminations sound, and the plate bolts
tight. Also, I wanted to know the depth of the separation, which ranges from
maybe 1/2-1 millimeter wide at the very most, so I used a very thin piece of
steel and found that it was only about 1/4'-1/2' deep. Should this flaw be
cause for concern, or is it likely not going to affect the stability? The
tuning seems to be holding, but then I just finished it maybe an hour ago
so... <BR><BR>Would it maybe help to 'fill' this crevice with thin west
systems epoxy, until it fills the area, then just let it dry and move on, or
would that just be a waste of time and epoxy? Or maybe Gap filling CA? Of
course, it would take quite a of CA to fill a 56' long, 1/2' deep cevice!
Thoughts and advice would be appreciated! <BR><BR>PS: See the
pics.<BR><BR>Terry Peterson<BR>
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