lessons learned

[Farrell]

Tom, thanks for sharing. My heart goes out to you. 

Although being that you had identified the plastic flange problem six months previous, when the first one broke (upon removal of the first elbow) I should think that you would have been justified to call the client over, explain again the problem with the plastic flanges - and the associated costs - and let the owner decide there and then how much they want to spend on the piano - or just pay you for the service call and call the junk hauler. Actually, even if you had not identified the plastic flange problem previously, when that first one broke I think it would have been appropriate to explain to the client at that time about the plastic flanges, associated costs, costs for removing and installing the action, likelihood of breaking more plastic flanges, etc.

I guess my point is that it wasn't your fault the flanges broke! I think it is much like a string breaking while doing a pitch raise (assuming you didn't overpull it too much). Remember - the string broke - you did not break the string - and charge accordingly.

Isn't it wonderful to have 20/20 vision AFTER the fact?

Terry Farrell
  
----- Original Message ----- 
From: <Tvak@aol.com>
To: <pianotech@ptg.org>
Sent: Friday, July 11, 2003 9:53 PM
Subject: lessons learned


> To all
> 
> Today I taught myself a couple of lessons.   First of all, I will never break 
> the following rule ever again:
> 
> Don't ever...ever....even TOUCH a plastic flange unless it is glued to the 
> doorknob of the exit door and even only then if there's no other way out.
> 
> I replaced a set of elbows today.   I knew that it had plastic wippen 
> flanges.   Why was I so careless snapping that first elbow in place?   The price?   
> Removal of the spinet action to replace the cracked plastic wippen flange.   
> 
> The other 87 elbows snap in place with no further problem due to extreme care 
> on my part.   Adjust the lost motion and...play the piano.   Hmmm...the 
> hammer on middle C is double striking.   I'll just move the backcheck forward 
> and... (What was I thinking...?)
> 
> Out comes the spinet action to replace the newly broken plastic wippen 
> flange.   While replacing the wippen flange I brush against a damper lever and...now 
> I can replace the plastic damper flange on that damper lever and... the one 
> next to it which I also bumped into with the screwdriver.
> 
> Back goes the action and as I play the piano I realize that the damper lever 
> on D5 is not damping due to it's also being cracked.   (I did look at them all 
> while they were out of the piano, but it was not visually apparent.)   Now, I 
> was nowhere near D5 so I wonder if this was a pre-existing problem, which 
> leads me to the next lesson I learned:
> 
> Check the piano first to see if there are any problems.   
> 
> BTW, my original service call on this piano was 6 months ago at which time I 
> replaced 4 elbows and informed the client of the existence of all the plastic 
> flanges, and the costs involved in replacing them.   I advised him NOT to put 
> any money into this Lester spinet, other than replacing those 4 elbows that 
> had already broken.   Six months later he called to tell me to go ahead with the 
> elbows.    In the back of my mind I was thinking, wasn't this the piano with 
> all the plastic flanges?   But rather than say anything, I just went ahead and 
> made the appointment.   Which leads me to the last lesson for the day:
> 
> Take better notes on each piano for future reference.
> 
> I rarely share my experiences with others on the list.    Hope this was worth 
> reading...
> 
> Tom Sivak
>