[pianotech] Yamaha gb1

Marshall Gisondi pianotune05 at hotmail.com
Wed Nov 23 21:32:20 MST 2011


Hi Everyone,
Today I went to tune a Yamaha GB1.  Last week when this woman called me, I was informed that her husband who is a cello player has really good ears and they've used three piano techs before who just couldn't seem to get the piano in tune or to stay.  So today I went to tune it, and before I did, I thought I'd take the little piece of hammer shank I have and go through and press gently near the bridge pins and close to the loop on the hitch pin to see if checking the string seating woudl help.  Then I tuned it, fixed a squeak in the two pedals, levers were squeaking.  So I thought great, I'm done. WRONG.
 
So the husband comes in, plays the piano and complains that the it sounded off in the "mid range" as he called it.  I spent extra attention with the E flat 3 and E4 octave while my poor wife and son waited for me in the car.  I worked with each note individually honed in the unisons even more.  He said the octave sounded flat, I said "Ok lets do some tests." Tests revealed octave was not flat.  He said that he didn't recall the piano doing this when they lived in CA.  His daughter who was ten maybe or  younger said to the extent, maybe you're were not paying attention.lol  I did notice that when I would depress the key very softly, the damper lifting would make this cool zing sound as if the note itself was playing softly, not the zing as a dry damper would make but sounds like the key is playing really low like someone trying to play an electric guitar with the powerr turned off.  push a note and hear the note sound ever so softly just by the damper lifting and the hammer not even touching it.  
 
So is this sound mixing in with the clean sound of the octaves causing his ears to hear what he is complaining about?  Are Yamaha GB1s known for any scaling problems?  Are these an improvement from the GA1 which they discontinued?  I'm the 4th piano tech, and so far I made the problem less annoying for him than any of the others could, but how can I be the tech that saves the day?.  I checked octaves, unisons, and I'm stumped. What do you guys think?  Is the damper making the note sound when I depress the key ever so gently causing this odd harmonic he is hearing?  I suggested that he hang in there with me so that I can research this and help him find a solution.  I involved him as much as I could but by the time I finally got out of there I was pretty aggrevated.  This messed up our schedule causing us to get stuck in traffic, thus picking up our youngst son at day  care even later and feeding the kids later.  I wish I could have solved this puzzler.  Thanks again Everyone.  I hope you have a great Thanksgiving.  I know we will  sorry for the long e-mail, but I had to describe this the best I knew how for clarity.  
Marshall


Marshall Gisondi Piano Technician
Marshall's Piano Service
pianotune05 at hotmail.com
215-510-9400
www.phillytuner.com 
Graduate of The School of Piano Technology for the Blind www.pianotuningschool.org Vancouver, WA



 		 	   		  
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <https://www.moypiano.com/ptg/pianotech.php/attachments/20111123/573d0040/attachment-0001.htm>


More information about the pianotech mailing list

This PTG archive page provided courtesy of Moy Piano Service, LLC