<!doctype html public "-//w3c//dtd html 4.0 transitional//en"> <html> <body text="#000000" bgcolor="#FFFFFF" link="#0000EE" vlink="#551A8B" alink="#FF0000">   Wimblees@AOL.COM wrote: <blockquote TYPE=CITE>In a message dated 8/9/99 4:20:24 PM !!!First Boot!!!, mjmc@ibm.net writes: << Hi List,    Has anyone seen, heard, played a new Petrof upright? I have a customer  considering trading her Young Chang F116 (46" console) and the dealer is  trying to talk her into the Petrof at a price of ~ 9k which looks like  the  retail price of a 52" upright in Ancott.  Thanks!!  Mike  --  Mike McCoy  So Central Pa Chapter 170 >> I have sold several of these, and the customers who are buying them tell me they play and sound better than the Baldwin and Yamah studios. Willem Blees</blockquote> This goes around and around. Its the same over here. Petrofs are very popular exactly because the make an good impression "soundwise",  whatever their flaws are otherwise. They do not play particularly well. One has to remember that for most folks, if the sound makes them smile, the rest of the piano is of course wonderfull. A Petrof does fine for most people, but from a technical point of view they are perhaps one of the easiest to pick apart and snuff your nose at. And I snuff at them all the time. Perhaps because they do have a decent enough sound. It seems to me that its a shame that they dont take care to use better materials, and insure better workmanship. They probably could make good piano if they did so. My point is, if you are a tech and get asked about a Petrof, be aware when looking over one, that bridge pins are most often sloppy, workmanship and quality of material on the pinblock is often shoddy, and the action is poorly put together. (on several notes typically you can hit just a bit past a medium soft blow and the hammer start getting jammed off to one side) There are other problems with them as well, but I do not feel competent enough to speak on matters such as beams and ribbing, etc, so I will leave that to others. Richard Brekne I.C.P.T.G.  N.P.T.F. Bergen, Norway </body> </html>