Stephen, All of the below issues would cause me to consider tuning the piano to a non standard pitch pluss one other or two. The piano most likely was intended to be tuned to a low pitch and will sound rather tinny at A440. Its nice to see you are having fun<G> Joe Goss imatunr@srvinet.com www.mothergoosetools.com ----- Original Message ----- From: "Stephen Airy" <stephenairy@fastmail.fm> To: "Piano Tech list - PTG" <pianotech@ptg.org> Sent: Friday, August 09, 2002 11:10 PM Subject: pull up to pitch or leave it there? > When you're tuning an older piano, what are some things you consider > when deciding whether or not to attempt to pull the piano up to concert > pitch or to leave it where it is? (assuming the piano is no more than > 50 cents (1/4 step) flat) > I just tuned my cousin's Geo. Steck upright (I'd say approx. 52" - > didn't measure it...) today. The serial # looked like it was in the > 13000s or 15000s - I don't remember - might have been 13543 or 13513 - > but I think the 4th and 5th digits were 43, and first was definitely 1. > Anyway.. this piano looked to be built in the 1880s or 1890s. It had > 88 keys, a 3/4 plate, was overstrung with an underdamper action. Piano > was approx. 40 cents flat, and it looked like several strings in the > mid to high treble had been replaced not long before. Considering the > replaced strings and the 3/4 plate, I tuned it where it was. The > action definitely needs some work, and the piano could use restringing > (unichords 1-10, bichords 11-27 (break between 26 and 27), and wrapped > trichords 28-31 were quite dead sounding, and a lot of plain steel > strings up to middle C seemed to be somewhat rusty, not to mention the > strings in the upper treble that had been replaced. Oh, this piano > had square shaped agraffe-like termination points throughout the entire > piano. > How do you determine whether or not to pull a piano up to pitch? > -- > Stephen Airy > stephenairy@fastmail.fm > > -- > http://fastmail.fm - Get back to work
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