[pianotech] travelin' lead on SNR

[William Truitt]

Speaking of dates, do they keep falling asleep on you?  

Will

-----Original Message-----
From: pianotech-bounces at ptg.org [mailto:pianotech-bounces at ptg.org] On Behalf
Of Ron Nossaman
Sent: Friday, September 18, 2009 7:24 PM
To: pianotech at ptg.org
Cc: caut at ptg.org
Subject: [pianotech] travelin' lead on SNR




This is one of the pianos for which I write "SNR" (still needs
rebuilt) on the card after the tuning date. It's a dead Baldwin L in daily
use in a teaching studio of one of the colleges I tune for. For fifteen
years, I've watched the hammers get flatter along with the soundboard.
Depressing as that is, there is one strangely entertaining thing about this
piano. A short length of pencil lead is migrating around in the habitation
layer of accumulated dust on the soundboard. 
Every visit, I look to see where the lead has gotten to since last time, or
if the dust has finally won and buried it. Like the "racetrack" rocks in
Death Valley, I've never seen it move, but it's in slightly different places
every visit, and the tracks show the limits of where it's been.

I know, it's pretty lame as far as entertainment goes, but I think it's kind
of cute. In contrast to tuning those unmaintained and mostly non functional
pianos every year, this is high drama.

The ultimate cheap date,
Ron N