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I have two Broadwoods up for restoration with the dreaded, threaded metal pin plate. The pins are rusted and bent and new sets need to be made. Does anyone have any advice on how to ensure the new pins are tight? Is there any wood beneath the plates that could be plugged and re-drilled to help hold them? What's the protocol? All advice welcome, thanks

Yes there is wood under the threaded metal plate.
If the threads are rusted and pins are not usable some people drill out the threaded part and fit normal wrest pins .For more detailed advice why noy ask Broadwoods themselves they have a website and you can contact them through that.

Thanks for the tip, I'll contact Broadwood. I've seen one or two that have been drilled and plugged but these restorations have to be in keeping (so lots of fun to tune later!) I've actually gone back to a T-Hammer for oblong pins, wrist feels like murder after!

This sounds new to me. For the benefit for those of us on the other side of the Atlantic, can you describe the Broadwood threaded metal pin plate?

Thomson, it may be new to you, but it was new to the world in 1863 or whatever...

The tuning pins have a real thread cut on them, similar to a machine screw. They tread into (through) the plate and into the hardwood pinblock below.

Broadwood usually put a felt punching onto every pin, below the coils, so it is not easy to see what is going on down there... I am not sure when this arrangement was discontinued, but surely 100 years ago, I would think.

Like the Mason & Hamlin string winder but different. I learn something new every day.

Broadwood fitted the threaded wrest pin plate from 1862 -1897 . They discontinued it after the death of it's inventor Henry Fowler Broadwood , it was very expensive to manufacture . You always see old photos of piano tuners using T hammers to tune oblong pins and like you I must admit I do too, it does make your wrist hurt but gets much better results than a modern crank.Good luck with the restoration , it would be great to hear how it turns out !

Thanks guys, I have the first one in now and I can clearly see an inch of hardwood underneath the steel pin-plate, it is two layers of beech laminated together with the grain at right angles for extra strength. I am drilling out from underneath and epoxying in end-grain beech dowalls. I can then re-drill a smaller hole from above without the need to remove the iron frame (typically buried in the case with these). The new pins are being made a fraction longer to get the best hold in the wood. String tension is low on these so I think this will be enough.