•[ Allen Scott wrote in 110101 MMDigest: > Recently while browsing the 'Net for information on a Steinway XR, > I found a company that restores and sells antique pianos, including > player pianos: http://www.antiquepianoshop.com/ Happy New Year everyone! I have been doing player action work for Anti...

•John Harrold wrote in 110221 MMDigest: "... there seems to be confusion about A=435 Hz and A=440 Hz tuning. The 1937 international symposium on tuning adopted as standard 435 Hz at 15 degrees centigrade. This had been used by the majority of builders (but not all) for some years. This is very close...

•Hi all, I thought the group might be able to give me some advice. While I've been around pianos for decades, this is a new one for me. A local church was hit by an arsonist and their Yamaha G-5 grand was subjected to much smoke (no heat, apparently). The Cleanrite folks claim the smoke is acidic an...

•Using epoxy as a filler is a huge mistake; throw out the West System epoxy. Your basic premise is correct that mixing the wood dust from the species you are restoring will give you a reasonable match. Epoxy is too strong, unyielding and brittle. It works great, maybe too good. Examine why the wood ...

•I wanted to post a follow-up to operating the Caliola in the local 4th of July Independence Day parade in downtown Martinez, California. I would like to say that it went off without a hitch, except we lost a trailer hitch. One of the Rotary Club members had a trailer. This trailer was sort of stran...

•> However, the tenor section (2nd last to the top) always goes out > before the rest. Your question seems a bit confusing to me. You say that the tuning pins are tight, but that the section (I term sections: bass, tenor (below middle c to the low end of the bridge), treble, mid-range (-treble) (whi...

•Marc Goodman said the tenor section of his piano goes out of tune, even though the tuning pins are tight. I'll assume Marc means intervals sound bad, rather than unisons. I was unclear on what Marc is calling the "tenor", but will make some more assumptions below. If single notes sound bad by thems...

•I've long wondered if anyone actually favored the sound of an out-of-tune piano. I now have my answer. As illegitimate as that sound is to a piano tuner, I must concede that if some listeners prefer it, and it has a cultural pedigree (no matter how motley), and a unique quality of tone, then it cre...

•Where have all the instruments gone? I recently found this article on the Internet that I felt everyone should read (see link below). It appears even with the best intentions, instruments are being lost to the cellars of time. Without donations of funds to sustain a collection, facilities do not ha...

•[ Ref. 120401 MMDigest, Steinway Duo-Art Roll Tracking Hi All, When I think about good music roll tracking, the first thing that comes to mind is the Style "O" roll and nickelodeons. Of course, these rolls and machines have no tracking mechanism whatsoever, and yet the rolls are played and rewound ...

•[ Adam Aceto wrote in 120810 MMDigest: > I have a late Ampico A (1928) Symphonique Grand. ... There is > a tiny squeak coming from the stack. I had a mint version of this piano at one time. My first thought was the lost motion pneumatics but you indicate it does this on full power. A wild guess wou...

•Randy, the stuff you have described in the 130114 MMD is almost certainly Bilon, which was marketed exclusively by Durrell Armstrong at Player Piano Company in the '70s and '80s and was assigned stock #47. IMHO, it was the greatest stuff ever sold for striker pneumatic covering. As I understand it...

•A working model of pneumatic action would be a great help in building interest in players among neophytes. When the economic crisis hit, AMICA and MBSI lost some members. This was a concern what with the general decline of special interest organizations. As then AMICA membership secretary it was ap...

•Following up on Douglas Heckrotte's observation that a 30-foot tube versus a short tube leading from the tracker bar to the striker made no real difference in sounding the notes. I, too, have puzzled over the fact that players have different length tubing, shorter in the middle and longer at both e...

•I have spent more of my time in the last 20 years restoring previously restored player pianos and reproducers than I have untouched. I love the untouched instruments much better as they take less time. I have probably seen it all when it comes to sealing metal valves to wooden valve boards. PVC-E g...

•In a recent digest, Lee Walker cited page 142 of my book, "Player Piano Servicing and Rebuilding," as saying the clearance between the pouches and valves in a Standard action should be 1/8". That isn't what I meant to say. In discussing the secondary valve buttons, the text says "... usually the bu...

•I have been corresponding with a man in Russia who bought a German-made player piano. According to him, there are few player pianos in Russia and piano tuners won't tune them and advise trashing the player mechanism. Sound familiar?! He has only two piano rolls, one is "Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2" by...

•Kevin, I have restored three 125's, so perhaps I can help. As this failure was sudden, I would start with taking a reading on the amount of suction. These little organs take a lot, and the suction pump is almost too small to do the job. Because the problem was sudden, the first thing I would look f...

•Recut Ampico piano rolls issued by Larry Givens (LG) sometimes show up in batches of old piano rolls that player piano enthusiasts collect. The rolls can be recognized by the labels on the boxes (and the rolls themselves) because they usually display his name and address (Wexford, PA). The printing...

•First off, I'd like to thank all of you for all of the positive emails that are still coming in. It's MMD that you should be thanking for allowing these posts to be possible. All that I hope to accomplish is to clarify the use and or installation of certain materials used in mechanical music machin...