I just completed the rebuild of a coinola "Cupid" model nickelodeon, (Bowers, p. 53). This is a keyboardless 54 note piano operated by an "A" roll with a coin slot. It was a complete basket case when I received it. Someone else some time ago was going to do the job and then died after taking everything apart. I had to work from photographs from other collectors to reassemble it. The pin block was separating from the case and was pretty much useless. It took 5 or 6 blows with a medium size hammer to get it to fall out. The glue around the parameter of the soundboard was non-existent so it pretty much just fell out of the piano once the block was removed. Bottom line I had to completely rebuild the piano back. The piano action was an absolute mess. The player was shot including missing parts. The motor pulley was also missing which had to be an exact replacement in order to accommodate the leather drive belt. I had to hunt the world over to find a collector with a spare. Numerous other player parts were also missing requiring fabrication. The valves were a mess with missing stems, warped disks, and rotten felt. There were separating glue joints in the wind chest, etc, etc. Bottom line it was a big 5 month project, (working evenings and some weekends). I started my career rebuilding these but it's been a long time. I really missed this kind of specialty work and thought I'd like to do some of it again. Most piano technicians HATE players, I think largely because they don't understand them. They want to tune, collect the fee, and get out. Most home players today are a mess. It is hard tuning many of them too because often portions of the player system have to be removed. Coin pianos in particular including this one require substantial disassembly just for tuning. It takes years to develop the skills to rebuild them correctly but the reward of hearing a machine that hasn't played in decades roar back to life is a thrill. Unfortunately the bottom has pretty much fallen out of the market for small coin pianos. Most collectors are going after the large machines now. People who used to collect the smaller machines would put them in their game room along with a juke box, bar, and a pool table. Now their buying HDTVs and X-Boxes. As a result it is very difficult to make a living at it. It's pretty much a labor of love and a desire to rescue these irreplaceable machines. This one belongs to someone and I lost money on the deal. It's still a thrill for me and I'll keep doing it as long as I come to terms that there is no money in it. If anyone has any small coin pianos that are sitting around in there shop gathering inches of dust and are happy to get them out of their way I may be interested so long as it doesn't mean traveling across the country to get something that is missing multiple parts nearly impossible to find, (like the entire wind chest, piano action, and the spool frame all at the same time!) Anyway attached are a couple pictures. Rob Goodale Las Vegas, NV -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: https://www.moypiano.com/ptg/pianotech.php/attachments/20070331/5b67fbb9/attachment-0001.html -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: image/jpeg Size: 110125 bytes Desc: not available Url : https://www.moypiano.com/ptg/pianotech.php/attachments/20070331/5b67fbb9/attachment-0002.jpe -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: image/jpeg Size: 92327 bytes Desc: not available Url : https://www.moypiano.com/ptg/pianotech.php/attachments/20070331/5b67fbb9/attachment-0003.jpe
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