[CAUT] how to move this piano?

[Porritt, David]

Many years ago I worked on an old Knabe that was made with very ornate carving all over the entire instrument.  It couldn't be put on its side or you would crush the carving.  The legs did not come off and were tied together with wood underneath.  It always had to be moved in a standing position.

The people who had it redone were moving from their N. Dallas estate to a penthouse downtown that was being redone for them.  Unfortunately the piano would not fit in the elevator.  The solution was to build a scaffolding elevator up the side of the building (18 floors).  The piano was padded and put upside down on the top of the scaffolding elevator.  It was moved to the roof of the building and lowered into the penthouse through the sky light.  The plate was not in the piano at that time.  I had to do the stringing in the penthouse with the other construction guys.  

The keys of this piano were covered with mother of pearl and in the room where they kept it, the sun made the pieces of mother of pearl come off, so they had a large canvas cover made to go over the sky light. It was controlled by a motor that could remove the cover for parties but cover it for the rest of the time.  

That was the most ornate piano I have ever had anything to do with.  Frankly, it was way overdone!

dp

David M. Porritt, RPT
dporritt at smu.edu



-----Original Message-----
From: caut-bounces at ptg.org [mailto:caut-bounces at ptg.org] On Behalf Of Mr. Mac's
Sent: Saturday, July 17, 2010 6:53 PM
To: caut at ptg.org
Subject: [CAUT] how to move this piano?

Dear CAUT,

Having viewed this pic, I wondered how indeed one moves it

Has anyone experienced moving a piano such as this?

Keith McGaven, RPT