Chris, I was involved in almost this same scenario when I was at Miami (Ohio) University. The building was built in the 60s and had terrible environmental controls, single-pane glass, etc. I was able to get a technician to resurrect a steam injector (which had been there all along) and got the humidity up to 40% in the dead of winter. Everyone thanked me, the pianos didn't go 40 cents flat, and sounded good. Then all the bad building things started happening....during a below zero cold snap, all the windows iced up (1/4 inch thick on some), the doors had so much ice dripping off the bottom that they wouldn't close, and so on. Soon things were back to normal, and the pianos all began suffering again. I eventually solved this problem (for me) by getting a new job here at CCM where everything was supposed to be state-of-the-art...100 million dollar building complex with, guess what? Inadequate humidity controls. It's not quite as bad as your building, but we are still swinging from 20% to 80% RH in some locations. The only saving grace is that they did design in adequate controls for the concert spaces (probably because of some state law) which at least saves us the nightmare of keeping concert instruments stable in such conditions. If you could get better controls in the concert and recital spaces it would make life better for you, and perhaps be inexpensive enough for them to consider. I did an economic analysis here similar to what it sounds like you are doing (our replacement cost came to $5.5 million!) and figured a modest 5% yearly depreciation rate due to the bad humidity conditions. This amounted to a yearly cost of $275,000. They told me thanks for all the good work and filed it away. I guess they weren't impressed with the trickle-out theory. What you really need is a good earthquake. I don't want to sound pessimistic, but I work in the same state system that you do and our budget from the state has been cut EVERY YEAR for the last 15 years. At least that is what I am told. Maybe you can use that 2 million dollar amount as a bargaining chip. A second technician would probably cost less than 1 million dollars over the next 30 years. Oh, I forgot...there's probably a hiring freeze until 2010. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Eric Wolfley Head Piano Technician Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music University of Cincinnati ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ -----Original Message----- From: Christopher D. Purdy [mailto:purdy@oak.cats.ohiou.edu] Sent: Friday, January 24, 2003 11:46 AM To: College and University Technicians Subject: Re: Hello Hello John and welcome to the list. By the number of challenges to John's claim of most extreme humidity fluctuations, It is obvious that many, or most, of us have to deal with this. Currently, after decades of complaining, the powers that be here at OU hired a consultant to assess our building and HVAC system. They produced a very in depth report that says: - Our building was built in the sixties and the current HVAC cannot provide the humidity control needed in the winter. - If we install the proper equipment, the building walls have no vapor barrier and therefor any increased humidity would simply go through the walls and outside. This would cause steel girders to rust and the mortar in the brick to breakdown and actually stain. (called efflorescence, for vocabulary buffs) - Ditto for the roof. - We also need to replace all the windows since they are single glazed and have the insulating qualities of wet newspaper. They recommend that we replace the windows, and install vapor barriers in all outside walls and the roof, and then replace the HVAC. This totals roughly two million bucks. In anticipation of the inevitable denial of this kind of money (or outright laughter), I am preparing a case to lay out just how crucial this work is. I listed the current replacement cost total of all 115 pianos in my building and by the most amazing coincidence, it comes to about $2,110,000. I am also documenting damage being done to pianos and including copies of temp. and humidity records I have been keeping for the past two years. Can anyone recommend anything else that may help my case? Has anyone been through this fight successfully and can suggest anything? Do any of you have a newer building with state of the art HVAC? What are the results? Is it worth the work? Will it actually help or am I howling in vain? Thank you and happy pitch raising! Chris -- Christopher D. Purdy R.P.T. School of Music, Ohio University Athens, Ohio 45701 (740) 593-1656 fax (740) 593-1429 purdy@ohiou.edu _______________________________________________ caut list info: https://www.moypiano.com/resources/#archives
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