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MMD > Archives > May 2012 > 2012.05.28 > 07Prev  Next


Bending a Warped Piano Key
By John Phillips

Hello MMD.  I have received at least half a dozen responses to my
warped key enquiry, for which I am appropriately grateful.  Here is
what I did.

I had a 'phone call from Rick Alabaster, a restorer I know in Melbourne
(which is about a one-hour flight from Hobart).  He suggested I use the
steam from a cappuccino maker.  This presented some difficulties,
because we don't have one, but during our conversation I remembered
that I do have a steam gun (a Sunbeam 1000 watt Eco Jet).

I made a jig out of a piece of chipboard with three dowels inserted
into it so that they stuck up like pegs.  They held the first key in
the final shape I needed.  I removed the key and gave the rear end
seven or eight minutes of steaming.  I kept the steam away from the
balance rail button, the capstan at the end, and from my fingers.

When I figured the key had received enough steam (well, I guessed that,
actually), I put the key onto the chipboard, between the pegs, and
clamped it down at both ends, to guard against warping.  I didn't touch
it until it was dried out.  It seems to have worked well -- the capstan
now sits properly under the sticker, and the key does not rub against
its neighbours.

Regards from John Phillips in Hobart, Tasmania


(Message sent Mon 28 May 2012, 06:42:31 GMT, from time zone GMT+1000.)

Key Words in Subject:  Bending, Key, Piano, Warped

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