Hi everyone. I'm still in VA. I just tuned a friend's piano today. It's a Gulbransen Console serial #600252, approx 40-42" tall. The piano was 50 cents flat, so I took 2 passes, overpulling it to about 15-20 cents sharp on the first pass, then fine tuning it on the second pass. Here's the loose pin question: The right tuning pin on high A (A-7 / A-85) was quite loose. It wouldn't necessarily pop out as soon as I let go, but it was way looser than the rest of the pins in the piano, like with the same effort that I would get a normal pin in the piano to change 20 cents, this pin would change a major third or so. What do you do about this situation? I don't have any spare pins or pin tightener or anything like that with me. Oh, one other thing -- when I opened the lid on the Gulbransen, I noticed (I think that's the pinblock on top cause I saw a few layers of wood that were different colors near the tuning pins) that there are a couple cracks in the middle of the top of the pinblock, and a quite wide one (big enough to stick a thin bass string through) at the treble end toward the back. They were a good inch and a half to two inches behind the laminations. Is this anything to be concerned about, or do pinblock cracks only affect tuning stability when they're closer to the pins? Now, for the dead bass question. Another friend has a $200 Kawai Grand (5'8" or something like that -- 26-note bass with 10 monochords, 16 bichords on bass bridge) with a dead bass section. This piano had apparently been in a fire. What would you do with the beast, short of restringing (which it definitely needs) or junking the piano? Would twisting and cleaning the bass strings work, or do you think it should have a new bass bridge and/or soundboard, neither of which looked cracked to me? __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Send your FREE holiday greetings online! http://greetings.yahoo.com
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