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CORFAM
http://brandfailures.blogspot.fr/2006/11/brand-idea-failures-corfam.html

ARTIFICIAL LEATHER
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artificial_leather

ECSAINE

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultrasuede

Jerry,
I am the technician at the store also and can say the piano was not making that noise at the store. The piano was only in the store for a short time before it was resold. I tuned it during this time, with no issues on it. I will probably be the one to fix it when it gets back in the store, and the store pays me very well for my time. The dealer is not in the habit of selling "junk" pianos, and by no means would leave a piano in a customers home that they were not happy with.

This situation really stumped me because of the way it happened so quickly. In the end every one is happy, the customer is getting a wonderful piano, I will have a new customer with a nice piano to service, and the dealer has a happy customer to spread the good word about his business.

I'm glad to hear that the dealer isn't in the habit of selling junk and that it turned into a wining position for everyone. I'm also happy to hear that you're pleased with your pay. Many dealers do not pay the techs squat.

I've worked on hundreds and hundreds of these Baldwins over the years. I'm surprised this is the first one you've seen. Unless you're a fairly new tech?

By the way, please read Piano World rules. https://www.pianoworld.com/forum/ubb...y%20Pros%20-%20READ%20THI.html#Post24766

It is possible that the client may not have bought a piano from the store at all if there hadn't been that used one, no doubt at an attractive price. So it is the cheap piano that gets the customer in the door, and in the end they wind up with a larger purchase of a new piano. Kind of like a bait and switch, but less intentional. In the end, if everyone is happy with the outcome, it is all good. (And, the dealer gets to keep the cheap used piano to bring another customer in through the door).

A friend action rebuilder of mine (now deceased) used to like to rebuild butts without removal. He removed the dampers, hammer rail and spring rail, then reworked both leathers and the butt felt. This especially makes sense on a fairly new action with this synthetic leather problem, considering that the rest of the hammer assembly may be just fine.

Thinking back, the reason I didn't care for his method much of the time is that on an older piano there are quite a few loose centers on those hammer butts in the central keyboard and some too-snug ones often at the extremes. In light of that, it made more sense to me to remove all the butts to do the rebuild. Of course, when you get to this level of tedium, the thought of new butts and shanks has to come up. Thirty years ago, however, we did some of the old uprights which had massive thick hammers with plenty of felt left, so we simply reworked the existing butt/shank/hammer as an assembly. Often, the customer got ten more years out of the hammer felt - or more.

Jerry,
I am surprised also I have not run into this, I still feel like a new tech, even though I have been working on pianos for 13yrs. If I am lucky I wont see another one of these Baldwins again. The dealer has been in business for 30yrs and not seen this, he was even a Baldwin dealer for awhile. Seems like some crazy odds neither of us has run across this before, maybe I need to go buy a lottery ticket. Thanks for the info, I do appreciate it.

You're more than welcome Steward. I'm glad I was able to help!

Dear Jerry,

Darn. Here I was hoping that someone had found a magic fluid to restore that nasty stuff to soft resiliency again with a dab of a hypo-oiler. Rats. One experiment I never tried was that car dashboard stuff that's supposed to make things soft again. ArmorAll! But, I never did try it....

I worked for a Baldwin dealership back in the 80's, when these actions started to clack. They used to give you a kit with hammerbutt leather and catcher pre-cut. The old material pulls out fairly easily from the butt (...or did then) and you can pretty easily get it replaced. The kit we were handed included CA-glue for the job with a small tip on the bottle.

You put a dab in the bottom of the hammerbutt leather and slide into the slot, pushing quickly to get it in with short tweezers, and then a dab in the top and push it into place. Hold for a moment and it's done. No glue in the center where the jack hits it. The job can be done with the parts on the rail, and this does save time in trying to re-regulate and align everything. But...honestly the dang hammers need reshaping anyhow! Goodness knows.

Did many a job on them. Still see them fairly regularly. Story I got from Baldwin was not that they were saving money. They could not get a reliable source for the leather, and looked for something else to replace it. Fake shoe leather developed for the Army seemed a good bet...not. Of course...that might be the story they were selling to explain the change!

Scratching the head,

There was a shortage of leather for a while. There was a Steinway from that era that I used to tune that had solid felt knuckles, not covered with leather. Aeolian was using cloth for leather on other parts.

For me, there is little question that Baldwin was trying to save money by scrimping on action materials wherever they could. One only needs to look at the narrow width of hammer rail cloth, key back rail cloth and other areas to see that they were saving at least 30% on material in those places by reducing the width to to absolute minimum. I have not seen it like that in any other brand, no matter how cheap.

Hi Jeffery,

Thanks for your reply and observations.

I agree with Jurgen's opinion too. I have no doubt in my mind either that Baldwin was scrimping . Besides looking for cheaper leather, look at what they did with the bridal wires on many brands? If you removed the straps or replaced them, which was inevitable, good luck getting them to stay back on again. It was virtually impossible with the lousy idea they had in changing the design of the wire itself.

I worked for a Baldwin/Yamaha/Aeolian/etc., dealer for 6 years 3 days a week. He was one of my mentor's and always stressed quality. He was a dealer/rebuilder/technician/RPT. He'd say things like; "you'll get further along in life doing the job right rather than doing a half a... job like anyone can do." Along with, "if you can't do it right, either call in the troops or don't do it at all."

My dad stressed those same words along with "honesty, intregrity and quality. "Those that have the best of these 3 things, will remain in business the longest when the economy turns sour" they would say. "The rest of them will find that what they do to cut corners will bite them in the butt one day."

My dealer always wondered why the rest of the piano manufacturer's seemed to manage to find the better quality material but Baldwin seemed to continue using the same old crap even years down the line.

In many cases, the corfam hardened already within the warranty period yet, it seems they continued using it regardless eventually winding up with tens of thousands of them with this stuff on them.

What really got to us as techs, was when Baldwin started dictating to us, what they would be willing to pay us to replace the stuff. It was so little that it wasn't worth doing the work so many techs that I know simply refused to do it at all. And that was only IF, it happened to show up during the warranty period. Sad.

Jeffrey,



If you still see these repaired pianos quite regularly, you might be able to answer something I've been wondering:

Is a cloth-to-wood or leather-to-wood repair using CA durable in the long term?

And if it is indeed durable, why is CA not used more extensively in action building and repairs? (Seeing as it is so easy and quick to use...)

A manufacturer (such as Baldwin back when) making statements about supply is probably saying secretly, "not readily available at the cost point we want." The demand/supply gets out of whack for a while, the cost goes up, so they go el cheapo!

Some of the old uprights have a very thick leather on the butt knuckles that I have been told was elk leather. I have never actually tried it, but there are internet sources these days for remnant portions of about any kind of leather, including buffalo and elk. I like the kangaroo sold by Schaff.

What is your favorite these days?

I usually just order it from either Pianotek which is located right here in Michigan or from Schaff cut into strips. Right now I've got a back stock of them from years ago yet.

As for these jobs? I won't do them. I sub contract them out. I have plenty of other "funner things" to do than that. College work, concert work etc.

When I did though, personally, I like real leather. I don't know what it's all made out of, never got into that but, the softer mushier stuff seems to bunch up more and allows hammers to bounce off from, rather than to catch them on the back checks. There are a few brands out there today that use the softer stuff that I speak of.

Mark,
from a manufacturing standpoint CA is one of the more expensive glues. Machinery can make efficient use of many cheap hot-melts and other cheaper types which work well. These adhesives are not as practical in hand work, unless the circumstances permit it. CA's advantage is speed and the fact that you don't need to clamp it for long, if at all. (Just don't glue your fingers in the process.) So, from a manufacturing standpoint, why use the highest price glue to only get a similar result.

On the other hand, the thin CAs tend to wick away. In other words they can soak into soft leather and felt. This eliminates much of a "glue line" which creates the actual bond. Also, it can harden the material which you want to adhere to the substrate. The type to glue leather, for example, would be the gel thickness or thicker, so as to prevent the problem. The bond itself is very durable, just not always the easiest choice.

In a similar vein, when using a water based glue, felt or leather can be sized first with a preliminary application of glue and allowed to partially dry, so that the real bonding layer does not soak in and become ineffective. The reason I like old hide glue with the glue pot is the benefits of low-to-no clamp time and the non-wicking property which the glue has. It cools so quickly that it does not have time to soak deeply, assuming it has not been chemically retarded and the glue is the right thickness for the job at hand.

And it allow to gain some stretch when it sets

Dear Jerry,

Yup. Along with that is the ever popular; 'There never seems to be enough time to do it right, but there's always time to do it over."

True, eh?

Dear Mark,

None of the CA glueing on these butts has failed to my knowledge. I've not had a callback on any in 20+ years, at least. I do NOT use CA for any major parts installing, as you are wondering.

I'm not enough of a chemist to tell you the problems with longterm CA aging. I do know that M&H, or the WNG parts section, are using CA for the hammer to shank gluing on the new tube-shanks they created. Bruce Clark gave a fascinating seminar in Portland on using the new WNG materials. I know they have confidence in their approach and the durability of the job.

Perhaps others can weigh in on this? One issue is easily seen on keyboards where an owner has CA'd keytops back on. The rigid glue (and others, too) fails when the keystick expands under the keytop and pops the joint. Might be an issue in other joints, too. Gotta use the right glue for the right job in any gluing situation!

Roger Jolly/Samick, at national, suggested using PVC-E glue to attach the leather pads on grand-trapwork (where the pedal rod contacts the lever, for example), and adds a drop of CA to get them to stay put immediately. I have used that idea successfully. But, using CA as a regular glue in actions? No.

Let's see what others have to say!

In breathless anticipation,
I am,
Turning blue....

The old glue for leather/metal was burnt shellac , worked quiet well .
PVCE works fine , sometime, I have seen damper felt glued with PVCE falling literally from the wood some 10 years later