BIG FRONT

[Ron Nossaman]

Now that (I trust) the subject line has focused your attention, I'd like to
do something a little unusual for list traffic of late. I have a comment
about a piano. That's culture shock, I know, but piano techs are a
resilient lot, so I suspect you'll be ok after a few deep breaths. If not,
take a pill.

I tuned a new Yamaha T 121 about a week ago and I'm still wondering about
something. Are piano cases designed by moist palmed sticky fingered tree
frog type new college graduates who were never required to lift a heavy one
piece slick polyester combination front/music desk/fallboard with no
available handles out of a piano using only two dry, calloused, "working
stiff" front paws? Have they ever lifted anything heavier than their mouse?
(don't say it) Whatever the official answer, I have evidence to the effect
that they are, and that they haven't. The only way I could find to grip
this monolithic front was to lift the full weight of it by one hand,
grasping the center of the hinged fallboard lip, which flexed quite
entertainingly during the process, and balancing it with the other hand at
the top center of the front panel while I coaxed it out of the piano and
levitated it to a safe landing spot. If they had even put a small block of
wood at top center inside, like they were planning on installing a lock,
but didn't, it would have given me something to hang on to. Sticky fingered
people have no idea how hard it is for dry fingered people to grip flat
smooth panels. There's no traction! Especially when the thing weighs about
thirty pounds. What's the average number of times one can lift this
front/fallboard combination out by the fallboard lip until the lip parts
company from the fallboard? I don't want to do this kind of research! There
are lots more interesting things to spend time on. I haven't gotten to it
yet, but I plan on letting the dealer know that I intend to install (glue
and screw) a block to the back center of the front as part of the service
bond. It's a survival imperative.

Now I've got to ask. Haven't we outgrown this kind of thing by now? Why
not? Are we going to start seeing long hinges on the bass end of vertical
lids next, with the pin inserted from the rear? Three foot screws,
installed from the bottom and holding the lid on, might be an award winning
idea too if they can be made to fit a non standard driver. Service access
to the instrument is a pretty basic and straightforward requirement. It
shouldn't be all that difficult a concept to grasp, even for a college
graduate that's been educated to the depth of his last brain cell. Who
thinks this nonsense up? Why don't they spring for a service call by a
working tech to come in and critique the plan before they crank up the
production lines? Perhaps there's just some mindlessly simple and
devilishly clever way of getting that bloody front off that I was just too
brain dead to see. I'd actually like that, if someone would explain it to
me, because it would mean that the case designer was actually thinking and
the problem was with me... I'm trainable. 

Yamaha isn't, by far, the only problem in this area. Their piano, and this
specific model, just happened to have been the last one that annoyed me
enough to bring it up.

End Rant.

Ron N