Ken Hale wrote: > > > and then she said something like "I got you" and showed me the fake > spill. We had a good laugh and talked about it for awhile. > >Two of my favorite "disaster pianos" were incredible! 1. I found a spinet with a completely jammed keyboard and discovered "total mold" inside. When asked they said there used to be a ten gallon aquarium on the piano lid. Of course, you know what happened! 2. A Yamaha console, again with a jammed keyboard; push the key down and there it stayed. Opened up, the keys throughout most of the middle had an oily-looking stain all over them. When asked, the owner confessed that one of those lamps that have the gut strings around the outside where a clear viscous liquid slides down to a reservoir at the base, had been dropped on the piano spilling most of the liquid down the front and onto the keys. "What is this stuff?" I asked (always the "straight-man"). When the bottle arrived, the label said "GLYCERINE" in large letters! For you "newbies" to our trade, glycerine is the main ingredient of the infamous liquid tuning pin "tightener" still sold by some of the supply houses, which turns pin block wood into mush and causes terminal rust to any wire it touches. Believe me, ignoring the problem is more responsible than using that stuff! For case #1, we clamped the sections down to a flat iron plate and put them into the dry box for a week and then rebuilt the keyset. A real learning experience! Case #2, we used kitty litter to draw out the glycerine. We packed the keys in a box sandwiched between layers of cat litter, and piled the keybed four inches deep. Then we split for two weeks. They came out of the box looking like wood again rather than caramel candy! Our troubles were far from over, but were plain old grunt work and not panic time! Warren
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