Becket breaker? - Technique

[Porritt, David]

Does no one else cut strings with a Dremel tool?  I take tension down a
turn (well I did the last time I did any belly work) and then cut the
strings with the cutting wheel with a Dremel tool.  Very fast!

 

dp

 

 

David M. Porritt, RPT

dporritt at smu.edu

 

From: pianotech-bounces at ptg.org [mailto:pianotech-bounces at ptg.org] On
Behalf Of AlliedPianoCraft
Sent: Monday, July 07, 2008 5:25 PM
To: Pianotech List
Subject: Re: Becket breaker? - Technique

 

Kendall & Diane,

 

The system I have used and I think someone has mentioned this on the
list, is to turn all the pins out one complete turn. I them use a
screwdriver which ground down a to narrow the tip to remove the becket
from the tuning pin. I then proceed to remove the tuning pins with a
drill. Once all the tuning pins are removed, I cut the coils and remove
the strings.

 

Just another way to do it.

 

Al Guecia

 

 

 

From: Kendall Ross Bean <mailto:kenbean at pacbell.net>  

Sent: Monday, July 07, 2008 3:41 PM

To: pianotech at ptg.org 

Subject: Becket breaker? - Technique

 

Diane~

 

Hi~

 

I still use a becket breaker, for the reasons that Allen and the others
have described.

 

I hope I didn't misunderstand what you wrote, but bear in mind that even
though you may not have completely severed the becket, you may have
nicked it enough so that it broke easily when you backed out the pin
with the drill. I have found that beckets I have not tried to break with
the becket breaker first will often not break with the drill. (-depends
on the wire, and how brittle it is.)

 

The proper technique with the becket breaker is something that eluded me
for some time, until I finally realized what the issue was. Until I
discovered it, it was very frustrating trying to use the tool. If you
are finding it difficult to break beckets on some pianos, the following
may help you. (I noticed that in consulting Reblitz's latest book on
servicing tuning and rebuilding, he recommends prying the beckets out
after loosening the coils, and doesn't even mention the becket breaker,
perhaps because for many people it really isn't an easy tool to learn to
use.)

 

Once you get the technique down, it really only takes 10 to 15 minutes
to break all the beckets, and I think it makes things a lot neater and
more efficient. 

 

(Plus it's a good workout!)

 

I also prefer leaving coils on string ends where I can, because I feel
it makes them less hazardous in disposal (less apt to poke someone's eye
out.)

 

I was training my daughter in how to use the becket breaker (she is
apprenticing with me) and even when I taught her what to do, it still
took her a little while to get the technique down and to understand why
sometimes it worked for her and other times it didn't.  Now she can do
it pretty fast (although like me, she still fails sometimes to sever an
occasional one and has to go back, reposition the tool, and hit it
again. Usually I find that (when I have been restringing regularly) I
can pretty much tell by sound and feel whether the becket has truly been
severed or not.

 

I have generally had pretty good success with the becket breaker, (once
I learned the tricks), and it does keep the plates from getting
scratched up and gouged by broken string ends when spinning the pins
out. (Even in the agraffe section of grands, where you have to cut the
loops off anyway to get them through the agraffes, I still break the
beckets). 

 

Here are some tips on how I do it, which may (or may not!) help you.

 

I don't know what kind of hammer you use, but I have found it has to
have some weight and momentum, ideally. I use the same 2 1/2 or 3 lb
sledge I use for restringing, but you may find a somewhat lighter hammer
will work also. 

 

Perhaps more important,  I make sure that when I place the becket
breaker it's tilted toward the becket, so that its cutting edge is right
on the point where the becket enters the hole in the pin. (See attached
photo.)  It's like the two blades of a pair of scissors. The inside edge
of the becket breaker is one blade, and the side of the hole in the
tuning pin is the other. If the edge of the breaker tool is not right up
flush against the tuning pin where the wire enters the hole, it's like
trying to cut something with a bad pair of scissors. You want to make
sure the inside edge of the breaker is right at the intersection of the
wire and the hole. (They don't give you any instructions or tell you
this when you buy the tool. As a matter of fact, someone ought to write
a book on how to use common restringing (and other) tools.)

 

The becket breaker you usually get from the piano supply houses was
designed "oversize" to accomodate a number of different size pins. The
ideal shearing tool would fit the pin much more closely but since what
we get is a "universal" tool we have to adapt. So you have to personally
make sure it's business edge contacts the right spot, which means you
have to tilt it slightly to make sure it cuts the becket right at the
point where it enters (some people would say "exits") the hole. What
happens when you don't make sure the edge of the breaker is right at
this junction is that horrible thing where it pulls part of the becket
out of the hole and bends it down instead of making a neat cut, trapping
the bent becket between the inside of the tool and the tuning pin. Then
the fun begins: trying to get the stuck tool off the pin. If you're not
feeling strong that day, this can seemingly take forever. This also
tends to happen more often on those pianos where they have put the
infamous "coil lock" on the pin, requiring special diligence.

 

Tilting the breaker toward the becket requires an awareness of where the
becket is, so it's also easier to do if the previous stringer had the
beckets all lined up in the same position, or, if you kept them in
alignment/aligned them when you lowered the tension on the strings
before shearing the beckets. (You do lower the string tension first,
don't you?)  It sounds to me like some technicians don't bother to lower
the string tension before either cutting the strings or breaking the
beckets. (Personally I don't think this is a good idea - In my
experience the beckets are far easier to break when the coils aren't
tight, and are extremely difficult or impossible to break if they are. I
unwind the pins a quarter turn each (in the proper sequence) when
lowering the string tension. This loosens the coils enough to make the
beckets easier to break.)

 

When using a heavier hammer it's important to make sure you don't cause
the same problem you're trying to avoid by hitting the tool so hard it
drives the coil all the way down into the plate finish! After I got the
rhythm it was fairly easy to just raise the sledge a few inches above
the tool and let it drop. (See attached photo). Once you get a feel for
the exact amount of effort it takes to break the becket, you will be
amazed at how quickly it goes.

 

-and yes, when I first discovered I could snap the string with the drill
I was tempted to dispense with the becket breaker too, until I
discovered I was spending far longer patching up the dings and gouges
that spinning/snapping string ends left in the
plate/soundboard/bridges/me. 

 

One last thought: Even though you are not exerting the same pounding
force as when driving new pins, I still think it's a good idea to
support the pinblock in a grand when breaking beckets. I feel it also
makes it easier to shear the beckets when the pinblock isn't flexing.

 

Hope this helps.

 

~Kendall Ross Bean

PianoFinders

 

e-mail: kenbean at pianofinders.com

 

 

 

 

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