agraffe stub misery

[Barbara Richmond]

Hi Patrick,

Have you by any chance, gotten your copy of the March PT Journal?  The Central Illinois Test Kitchen article on the Grabit Broken Bolt and Screw Extractors might be able to help you out (page 18).  John Dewey, Chuck Beck and I had a grand time experimenting with a bunch of different screws/situations.  In your case I think starting the dimple with a diamond ball-tip dremel bit would be easy enough, since that could be done at an angle.  Look at the picture of the Grabits--I believe something very similar is sold at Sears, if you didn't want to order them directly from the Grabit site.  The Grabit bit will fit in a hex-bit extender--or the <right> hex-bit extender.  Try it out in your shop--you might like it better than left-hand drills and easy outs.

Good luck!

Barbara Richmond
near Peoria, Illinois
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: J Patrick Draine 
  To: Pianotech List 
  Sent: Friday, March 07, 2008 1:27 PM
  Subject: agraffe stub misery


  Sure, sometimes it's EZ, but other times it's hell. The customer has a big (7 ft or so) old (ca. 1889) H F Miller grand, and there's a popped off agraffe at the note just above the top treble section strut. A couple weeks ago I was at the customer's home, at which time I tuned & voiced their Yamaha G3. After finishing that, I took a look at this big ol' relic. I tried the "tap a snaggle toothed screwdriver into the stub remnant & back it out" routine. Also the "see if you can tap it counterclickwise to back it out" scenario. No go.
  Well, I knew my left hand bits were back at home, so I packed it in for the day. Made a follow-up appointment for earlier this morning. Set my high torque drill and left hand bits down, opened the piano up & took another look at that agraffe stub. OOK, it's RIGHT NEXT TO a massive (3" or so tall) strut! The chuck on my drill is way too fat to center the bit into the stub. So my plans to drill a hole into the stub & spin it out were thwarted.
  So what's my best option? I don't think I'm going to find a set of superlong left handed bits. A very skinny flex shaft? Anyone have a preferred brand? A while back my local hardware had a very lame looking (no name China made) version -- I would prefer to get something others have had success with.
  Thanks in advance,
  Patrick Draine RPT
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