A church is giving away a piano that is from the 1970s - a Spinet- and offered it to me. The problem is that there are like 10 random keys that are fully depressed and don't make any sound when struck.
I was wondering if it would be worth getting the piano and having it repaired or no. I looked inside the thing, but couldn't see what could be wrong.
I am guessing broken keys that need repaired, but I really am not sure. If any one has any advice I would appreciate it much.
Thanking you in advance,
~Stephanie
Broken Keys
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Barrie Heaton
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This is a bit harsh on spinets in general, and possibly this one in particular. It may well be that some drop-lifters are unhitched from the keys. Actually broken keys are not very common. Depending upon the action it might be disloged butt-springs.
I do not find most spinets to be a bit more trouble to tune than any other small vertical piano, except that I have to pad my elbow to keep from banging it on the key pins. The big bugbear about spinets it that pulling the drop-action can be a nuisance if you don't know what you're doing. many repairs do not actually require removing the action although the job may be easier with it out of the piano.
Have some professional actually examine the instrument before condeming it. Diagnosis from a very general description is shooting in the dark usually.
Tom Tuner
I do not find most spinets to be a bit more trouble to tune than any other small vertical piano, except that I have to pad my elbow to keep from banging it on the key pins. The big bugbear about spinets it that pulling the drop-action can be a nuisance if you don't know what you're doing. many repairs do not actually require removing the action although the job may be easier with it out of the piano.
Have some professional actually examine the instrument before condeming it. Diagnosis from a very general description is shooting in the dark usually.
Tom Tuner
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Barrie Heaton
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Its what you are use to, I smile at some of the comments made about Birdcage pianos in the USA to us they are a doddel. But the spinets are a pain because we don't work on them often we tend to hate them when we do.Tom Tuner wrote:This is a bit harsh on spinets in general, and possibly this one in particular.
Tom Tuner
Barrie,
Barrie Heaton
Web Master UK Piano Page
Web Master UK Piano Page
Actually I don't mind working on birdcage pianos providing they are structurally competent. Many of those imported here are...shall we say, less than robust. The last one I worked on required making a steel hitch-pin panel for the bass strings before it was tunable.
The 'warped minds' were Haddorf and Winter & Co. and that was what kept the remainder of the US piano industry to survive another 45 years. I get a bit cheesed off on this subject because I have quite a number of customers who would either not have any pianos at all, or considerable worse one if they did not have spinets. As you say, it's all in what you are used to.
Do you really call them birdcages also? I thot that was strictly an American usage.
Tom Tuner
The 'warped minds' were Haddorf and Winter & Co. and that was what kept the remainder of the US piano industry to survive another 45 years. I get a bit cheesed off on this subject because I have quite a number of customers who would either not have any pianos at all, or considerable worse one if they did not have spinets. As you say, it's all in what you are used to.
Do you really call them birdcages also? I thot that was strictly an American usage.
Tom Tuner
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Gill the Piano
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Yes, but why were they designed? And were they purposely designed with built-in lost-motion and untuneable scales? After all, the Rest of the World bypassed these idiotic items in the evolution of the piano. In general, homes in the USA are larger than ours in Europe, so it can't be for reasons of economy of space. Europe's piano makers managed to get along nicely without designing or adopting these over-complicated items, the odd English mini-piano excepted. The US Spinet is as relevant to the modern piano as the tail-fin to modern car design, and much less endearing. An entire lexicon of quasi-technical terms was contemporaneous: "Full-Blow Action" (meaningless) "Mezzo-Thermoneal Stabilizing Process" (Wot??) "Acrosonic" (acros=perfection, sonus=sound..... So how come they sounded so nasty?.... Actually, the Baldwin Acrosonic in its earliest form was quite acceptable, but later ones were rubbish) "Synchro-Tone Bass Strings" (ha ha ha!!) "Betsy Ross" (now that's just silly) - All terms which could have been dreamed up by the wonderful Bruce McCall or James Thurber in a moment of anti-consumer genius.Tom Tuner wrote: The 'warped minds' were Haddorf and Winter & Co. and that was what kept the remainder of the US piano industry to survive another 45 years. I get a bit cheesed off on this subject .... *blah...*
My guess is that the Americans never fell out of love with the square piano; an instrument that they coaxed the last bit of performance from, the final designs being huge great things the size of billiard tables with keys the length of snooker cues and iron frames like bulkhead doors from the Titanic's engine room. By styling the front half of a dumpy squat little Spinet like these leviathans, maybe they thought that somehow they were retaining a bit of the spirit of the square?
The trouble was that they were made too badly and too cheaply. A spinet is more complicated than a regular upright, so it needs to be made very precisely and the scale needs careful design to work properly. Because these heaps were made to the lowest price possible, build quality was generally lacking and design overlooked. I'm not really a fan of the English overdamper either, but most were based on a design as simple as an Austin Seven and made from decent materials. The complicated little Spinet simply could not be made well enough and also sell for small bucks. As previously mentioned, the early Baldwin Acrosonics were well-made pianos, but the design was systematically cheapened over the years for cost-cutting reasons until they became utter rubbish.
Now, the current president aside, I'm actually quite an americophile, so I'm not being deliberately anti-American over this matter, but why bother repairing one of these nasties when almost any other design of piano is superior?
They were designed to fit contemporary furniture design and interior decor, and because there was no market for full-sized upright pianos.
Lost-motion on most spinets can be more easily regulated than on many uprights, e.g key rockers.
"Full-blow Action" as distinguished from a compact console action.
Baldwin actually fumbled their Greek etymology. Evidently they ment "Arcosonic", but that's not so euphonious.
As far as complication goes, how about a vertical action with lost-motion compensator and sostenuto?
As in all else piano-wise there were both well- and ill-made spinets and one cannot tar them all with the same brush. Rubbish is rubbish no matter how tall it is.
The only defense I can make for the square hanging on for so long is that it was simple and cheap to make. Until the domestic industry got started upright actions had to be imported from France which tended to make the pianos rather expensive for the intended market.
'Syncro-tone' bass-strings referrs to a specific string-winding machine and process.
'Mezzo-thermoneal' was cerainly a siily term, and although it was a definate manufacturing process I could never tell that it made any actual difference
I have found one virtue of the over-damper action: about the turn of the previous century some German makers took advantage of the possibily of providing a true una corda pedal, which would hardly be practical with a usual under-damper action.
Tom Tuner
Lost-motion on most spinets can be more easily regulated than on many uprights, e.g key rockers.
"Full-blow Action" as distinguished from a compact console action.
Baldwin actually fumbled their Greek etymology. Evidently they ment "Arcosonic", but that's not so euphonious.
As far as complication goes, how about a vertical action with lost-motion compensator and sostenuto?
As in all else piano-wise there were both well- and ill-made spinets and one cannot tar them all with the same brush. Rubbish is rubbish no matter how tall it is.
The only defense I can make for the square hanging on for so long is that it was simple and cheap to make. Until the domestic industry got started upright actions had to be imported from France which tended to make the pianos rather expensive for the intended market.
'Syncro-tone' bass-strings referrs to a specific string-winding machine and process.
'Mezzo-thermoneal' was cerainly a siily term, and although it was a definate manufacturing process I could never tell that it made any actual difference
I have found one virtue of the over-damper action: about the turn of the previous century some German makers took advantage of the possibily of providing a true una corda pedal, which would hardly be practical with a usual under-damper action.
Tom Tuner
In that case only the rubbish was sent over here to be palmed off on us Brits. Most spinets in the UK date from the late 1970s to early '80s when the USD was weak compared to GBP. Let's hope that the flood of US built pianos that we'll inevitably get now we're in the same situation are somewhat better.Tom Tuner wrote: As in all else piano-wise there were both well- and ill-made spinets and one cannot tar them all with the same brush.
So Tom, are they?
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Gill the Piano
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It sounds as though you got an overdose of Kimball and Whitney spinets, of which I have suffered my way through several thousand. They are tiresome to tune and putting H-B actions in them did not improve them (from what they were otherwise).
Betsy Ross is an icon of American mythology, and her spinets are not too bad either, aside from many of them having "waterfall" keys. Nancy Hart spinets, or anything else made by Kinkaid, are about as bad as they get.
The early Acrosonics have Wood & Brooks SIS actions which are nearly impossible to use a capstan wrench on without actually taking the key out because the auxillary wippens completely block access to the capstans
We got a few rather flakey Japanese pianos from the 1950's and '60's which were brought back by returning servicemen because they were very inexpensive to buy there at that time.
Tom Tuner
Betsy Ross is an icon of American mythology, and her spinets are not too bad either, aside from many of them having "waterfall" keys. Nancy Hart spinets, or anything else made by Kinkaid, are about as bad as they get.
The early Acrosonics have Wood & Brooks SIS actions which are nearly impossible to use a capstan wrench on without actually taking the key out because the auxillary wippens completely block access to the capstans
We got a few rather flakey Japanese pianos from the 1950's and '60's which were brought back by returning servicemen because they were very inexpensive to buy there at that time.
Tom Tuner
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Gill the Piano
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Barrie Heaton
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They have no overhang and are covered in one-piece plastic bent at 90º and wrapped over the front. Some old school pianos had them to prevent the little darlings peeling the keytops off, as did a few Tropicalised pianos and the big models of Hammond organ.Gill the Piano wrote:What are 'waterfall' keys? Sounds intriguing!