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Always a pleasure to see the beautiful work presented here.

Best regards-

Thank you, Chuck!

That Chickering has an interesting style. With those hind legs and curved in ends, it looks like it tries to evoke a square grand.

I like how you got the dog in the same spot for both pics!

Hi guyl - This style is certainly interesting - also way more work to refinish than the typical spinet. When I estimated the job, I made the mistake of quoting our ordinary price for a spinet case. What I should have done is use our upright price for the quote. I'm sure there was as much square footage to do on this piano as the typical upright. Well, live and learn.

Max, my shop dog, is never far from the action, and is usually standing nearby as if waiting for instructions. If I could just get him to hold a varnish brush!

Have a great holiday week! Chuck Behm

I picked up a baby grand that had one foot in the dumpster a while back. It was pretty rough, but had good bones. A 1929 Ampico "Symphonique" that had the reproducing action removed.

A friend of mine and I spruced it up considerably (it didn't need rebuilding, just some action work and a new set of hammers), and delivered it yesterday to a friend of his, all for the cost of the new hammers.

A labor of love, if you will.

For what it's worth, it sounds great. After it acclimates and I tune it and finish regulating it, I'll post a recording of it.

Here it is when we started on it, pretty rough:




And here it was yesterday, right after moving it in to its new home:




(We have the bench - just finishing up on repairing and refinishing it)



There is a spot on the lid where we replaced some of the veneer, and it didn't color match up very well. Considering this was a gift, essentially, we weren't too worried about it.
BTW, this is a brushed-on shellac finish.





The trim on the case is quarter-sawn maple, something that didn't really stand out until we refinished it.

My friend did a very meticulous job of cleaning up the plate.



And here it is with its new owner:

Good job bringing this piano back to life for a happy owner, Mr. Boydston. I like the toning seen in the bottom-most photo, characteristic of a certain era ( I'm not sure which time-frame, actually).
Best regards-

Here's a link to a video diary that I made of a Story & Clark piano that I refinished for a customer. Delivering the piano today.

[link]http://youtu.be/z4pMqklU2KA[/link]

Cool.

I would guess you had to be careful around the
Story and Clark brand sticker, because if you
damaged it, it would be hard or impossible to find
a replacement.

Story & Clark decals are readily available.

Oh, ok.

So do you usually just sand off the old sticker, and
put a new one on after all the finishing?

What about the bigger decals you find on the soundboard?