I am questioning using player piano rebuilding materials that have
been sitting for many years, such as rubberized bellows and pneumatic
cloth as well as tubing, hoses, and leather. I rebuilt many player
pianos, decades ago. I am now starting to get back into it and have
a lot of new old-stock I am questioning.

I recently rebuilt an air motor as a direct result of being listed
on John Tuttle's Player Care website ( https://www.player-care.com/ )
(Thanks, John!) The bolt of cloth used for this had been around for
many years. It seemed like brand new so I used it.

I did take cloth from a few turns inside the bolt of cloth, even though
I could not discern any difference between what had been exposed on the
outside of the bolt for years, and the cloth inside the bolt.

In the case of this air motor, if it did prematurely wear out, it would
not be that big of a deal to redo it. The story would be different when
rebuilding the pneumatics, pouches and valves in a stack. I am also
questioning pneumatic tubing that have been in their boxes as well as
twill hoses that have been sitting out.

Do the readers of this forum have thoughts or guidelines as to how
'fresh' do rebuilding materials need to be when doing a new rebuild?

Are there reasonable tests out there to verify if certain materials
should be used in a new rebuilding job or not? Should certain materials
be discarded after a certain age, no matter what?

Gary Rasmussen
Mason, Ohio (Cincinnati area)
gary@musicalinsuranceguy.com.geentroep [delete ".geentroep" to reply]