Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Piano Tuner-Technicians Forum problems with a tuning today.

I was asked to tune a Grand spinet today.The panels were already removed when I got there.

Upon seeing the strings,many of the treble strings were rusty.I forewarned the couple the I expect string breakage to occur.Only one broke,and many of the tuning pins in the high treble,bottom row were loose.

I also found the bass bridge apron cracked.

I advised the couple that this brand of piano is a cheaper brand,and suggested they look for a better brand,but they want to fix this one.

I recommended oversize tuning pins and new strings for the high treble,and if they hold a tuning,then go for the bass bridge repair.

Anyone have other recommendations on this ,besides the landfill?

The CA glue treatment would probably be more appropriate for fixing the loose pins. If the loose pins are all in a row there is a good chance that there is a split in the pinblock. Putting oversize pins may cause the split to get worse and not fix the problem.

On these types of pianos I keep the client's expectations as low as possible, and try to spend as little of their money as possible to nurse it along. Recommending another piano is certainly appropriate, but you must respect their decision to keep it in the meantime.

For pianos like this, I go to Craigslist and find them something someone wants to get rid for less than the cost of repairs.

Where the string broke,I put one of my next size up tuning pins,and it was very tight.Does this sound like it can still be repaired?

With some of the notes which couldn't hold at pitch,the owners were still happy with how much better it sounded.

You can do a CA treatment, however, this piano really needs to be replaced. I doubt if I would have tuned it, given the issues you have described.

A pinblock is laminated but still can crack. If you have a single pin or two too loose to tune you may be better off shimming the existing pin with a bit of veneer instead of using a larger pin. The larger pin may stress the block, spread the cracks and loosen the surrounding pins. Bob is right; your customer is better served by you accepting a reasonable evaluation fee and telling them to move on into a more reliable piano.

I contacted the people and they agree to that.

Some of you warned me about the
Lester spinet I brought home to practice on.It was holding its tune until the outside temperature dropped to 16 degrees overnight.I have replaced a few tuning pins on the bass side.They are holding.