new strings

[jolly roger]

Hi Harriet,
                A few tips that will help in this type of situation. Step
1. Make sure the coils are tight and the the string has been seated on the
bridge, and hitch pin. Step 2.  Tune the string a quarter step sharp.  Step
3.  Burnish the string speaking length, back scale, and counter baring
area, with a hammer shank, untill it is flat. This will get some of the
stretch out of the new string.  Step 4. Retune with forceful blows.  Repeat
the above but a little more gentle on the burnishing.
If both lengths of string are on the same note, you can mute one string of
the note and the adjacent note, then tune the octave a full beat sharp, if
the customer understands what you are doing.
Return in 30days or so, burnish and retune correctly.  It should now be
fairly stable with the unison. 
Works quite well for me.
Regards Roger.


At 04:38 PM 4/22/01 -0700, you wrote:
>This is certainly not a new question - but I need some
>new ideas - what do you do when you tune regularly (4
>times/year) for a piano teacher who teaches ALOT of
>students - and a string breaks, so you replace it -
>you tell her that the new one will be out of tune
>tomorrow - she understands that, but every two weeks
>the out-of-tune  string is driving her nuts - she
>would like to buy a tuning hammer and fix it herself,
>but I know that if she touches anything inside the
>piano, she will break it (she is extremely impulsive,
>almost hyper).  Do I just mute it off until it
>streches and tell her that she simply has to live with
>two  muted notes (in this case it is a bass bi-chord),
>or is there some other trick I don't know about?  I
>kept pulling it (way up) when I was there, but that
>lasts about two days, in my experience.  
>
>P.S. She doesn't live around the corner - maybe 10
>miles away - she also sends me a TREMENDOUS number of
>referrals - I DO want to keep her happy.
>
>I appreciate anyone's input.
>
>Harriet
>
>Long Island
>
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