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Went over a $992 waterfall and only paid 4 bits for the ride!

(It was a Conover-Cable spinet with waterfall keys that was 50 cents flat and had a price of $992 inside the lid from the factory.)

Thanks Ryan! Congrats for you and Jean too. 21 years is nothing to laugh at either with today's divorce rates! Good job!

This is really a different topic but, what the heck. It probably won't last long anyway...

Hey, have you ever tried using "The Electronic heating iron after filing hammers? I seems good for well, for lack of thinking of a better way of putting it, of eliminating the fluffy left over fibers from filing. I don't do it often but, I have fooled around experimenting with it to see if the hammers might not groove any quicker because of heating the felt. I'm not sure if it makes a difference or not to be honest. ?

When I file hammers, I've gotten very good at using a dremel with a guard of course that I carved out on the sides so it doesn't bind. The heat from the sand paper seems to help somewhat to meld the felt fibers together better than just filing by hand. Maybe I'm all wet on that one but, it sure appears that way because of the speed of the sand paper disk. It always seems to come out much smoother. Of course, when I'm done with the dremel tool, I always gang file lightly using up to 600 or even 800 grit sand paper to smooth it our as nicely as possible.

Mark,

I believe the current knot that we use, was invented by Yat Lam Hong. He is a member of my local chapter. We're lucky to have him too! He first showed us a method using a round nosed pliers. He perfected it making it smaller by using a vise grips. I took my son for a day this past fall to learn that particular method from him. Harder to do than it looks, I think.... Funny too, he kept saying, "cut, do again, not good enough."

Jerry:
I can see a vise grip coming in handy. I found that round nose pliers tend to slip if you make the loop too small. There's just too little grip surface (and leverage) at the tip of the pliers for such a tight bend. So, my newly-acquired hard wire cutter has been working hard at nipping off failed attempts.

It makes a very small and a very tidy knot indeed but, it takes lots and lots of practice to learn how to do it right and then even more practice after that in order to do it in the center of the tenor section of the piano without removing the wire at all.

Today, I tuned a Yamaha C-3, raised from 436-440.
Tuned a Schimmel grand, 5'8" I believe, raised from 438-440. Fixed a squeaky pedal.
Tuned another C-3, raised from 435-440.
Tuned a Yamaha P22, raised from 436-440.

Eased almost all of the keys on the P22 and tightened all of the hammer flanges.
I changed the wicks on the DC unit.
I changed wicks on the Schimmel grand too.

Then, the wife called the church I was at, I got a service call from a good client, another church clean on the other side of town. 25 minutes from where I was working. One sticking key. I drove over there when I was done for the day and fixed that and then found 4 more sticking keys... Fixed them all. All in all, it was a good $$$ day!

6 today. First a Baldwin Acrosonic spinet for a piano teacher. From there, 3 at a church: Steinway M, new Kohler & Campbell console, and new Essex studio. After that, off to another church to service a Nordiska grand that needed tuned and was also having damper issues. Took care of that and the off to a private residence where I finished off with a pretty nice Kawai grand that was about 125 cents flat. Strings, bridges, and structure looked good, so up to 440 it came. And now...WEEKEND!!

My trusty stead left me stranded Friday, doing a timing chain today, damper regulation on Monday. Boy it's fun being multi-talented... yea right.

Just the chain Les, and not valves and lifter components? You were not running high revs when it broke?
Oooohhh what a lucky man he was…….

Dan, just a lil ole chevy s10 4 banger w/157k on'er.... loooooots of clearance. Not one of those 32 DOHV machines... been there, done that lol. Doing my first key bushing job today too. Just removed the old ones and making my hot-pot using Spurlocks info. Found a Sunbeam pot for $12.95..new, thought that was a deal.

Yep I just did the belt in my wife Toyota Tercel…one of those DOHC motors I wasn’t taking any chances once it got to 70,000K …….didn’t want the motor scattered over a wide area….or have to shell out for a new replacement…

Good score on the pot Les…I meant the glue pot……anything that gets the glue to 145F is good thing…..

lol... almost fell off my chair...

Just as I thought, chain broke on me...gears are on, finish Monday...

Yea, I'm geared up about using some hide glue for the first time...in MY SHOP... a local tech here lent me his Spurlock chauls to use...:) after I charge for the bushing job, I'll be ordering my own, hate to borrow tools, my motto is if I borrow it more than once, I need to buy it...

Nothing. Yesterday? Nothing. Monday? Nothing... Had surgery on my right knee last Friday.. I'll be home for at least 2 weeks, no driving at all.

They found a torn meniscus..torn about 3/4 of the way around the knee. He said I "blew out my cartilage" whatever that means, I was kinda drugged up and have no idea what he's talking about but, will find out when I meet him in another week or so. I wonder if cartilage is the same as meniscus? Anyway, he also found a nice chip out of my bone in the upper portion of my leg. He drilled 6 holes into the bone attempting to get the blood to flow down into the open cavity where it chipped out. I guess it is possible for it to fill itself back in and then reincarnate the bone, or whatever, regrowing my own bone back into that area.

Otherwise, I have to either have a piece inserted from a cadaver or, a partial knee replacement at some point. But, I did manage to finally come down into my office, I"M GOING CRAZY!!!!! .... to see what's going on in here. I see you're all crazy too, as usual hahaha!

Wow, Jerry! Hope you're on the mend soon!

Today was pitch raise city. 4 tunings, 4 pitch raises. Gotta love it.

Thanks Loren, I'm getting there!

Jer, no getting the mail...you hear!!!

hoping your on the mend

OK! I'll send the wife out for it! hehehe. Just bring me in the checks, the rest can stay in the snow banks...

Finished regulating the dampers and the rest of the action on Andy's Lester spinet which had new dampers installed last week. Tuned it the best I could in the time I had. There could be a few bugs left in it but the repetition speed has to be experienced to believe! There were three or four geometry problems to solve but once they were, the action is as responsive as any piano action could ever be.

Not an easy piano to tune. A lot of false beats in the treble and a lot of inharmonicity throughout. The Bass sounds sharp no matter what you do.

I used a technique for the spoon adjustment I learned over 30 years ago from a film shown at a PTG Chapter meeting. No way could I ever get the tool made for that to work. Glad I know the alternative.

Went to a military band concert last night. As the oboe played the tuning note I wondered if they tuned to A or Bb. Then she played another tuning note one semi-tone higher. Ah, how democratic. They tune to both!

I've been home all week long with the flu. I also had to reschedule everything, didn't make any money this week, and I even had to cancel a gig on Tuesday night which I don't think I've had to do in the last 10 years. And I was kind of feeling sorry for myself until I read this, which really puts things in perspective.

Wishing you a speedy recovery, Jerry! Hope you feel better soon...

Thanks James,

I hope you are feeling better soon too! It's no fun being sick or getting old or being stuck home. I'd rather be outside cussing out the other drivers any day of the week! hahaha!

Yeah, I think I'm actually starting to miss the "excitement" of NYC street navigation after being laid up for four days...My wife thinks that MarioKart by Wii should have a "Brooklyn Edition."

I lived (and drove) in Los Angeles for 18 years, and yeah, its pretty crazy out there on the freeways, and I've also driven in about 40 states of this great country of ours (including Michigan several times Jerry)...but I think I can guarantee that, no matter where any of you live, you've never experienced white knuckle driving - coupled with sheer insanity- until you've lived and driven in Brooklyn. My take? Unless you are firing a weapon out the car window directly at a cop - you cannot get pulled over, no matter what you do!!!! It's the wild wild east, and yet we love this crazy place! No wonder our insurance is sky high...