Piano Life Saver

[G3och]

Hi everyone

Are Piano Life Savers a common thing in the UK? Are they really necessary?

Theres been a bit of crazy winter in the North West and the humidity fluctuations (39 to 52%) have unfortunately pulled my piano out of tune. Theres been a massive storm and then countless days of snow and ice. It usually sits around 48 to 52%!

I tried one of those hot/cold mist humidifiers at the beginning which unfortunately turned out to be a load of rubbish, when it only records the humidity within a 10cm radius of the unit and with an accuracy error of 10%. Unfortunately ive tried a variety of different methods such as wet clothing/towel on hot radiators to bring up humidity, works graciously until when you sleep and the air dries out.

Does anyone know the average installation and maintenance costs?

Can the humidity be adjusted on the unit or is set to 42% constant?

How do other players cope, do they just play as the piano goes more out of tune and get it tuned every 6 months to fall in line with season changes or do people's pianos just stabilise and not go out of tune as much?

Its a used Yamaha U3S in question which ive had since the end of October, i had it tuned in December and noticed it started moving out of tune very slightly after about a week (a week of sudden humidity fluctuation and lots of heavy fortissimo playing).

I am not sure if used pianos still have that adjustment to peoples playing and environment like a sparkly brand new piano, where they are recommended 4 tunings a year.

[chrisw]

I can't answer about Piano Life Savers as I have not had one fitted. I live in the north west of the UK and have also been watching humidity levels during the winter. I am not sure how accurate my little hygrometer is but when the cold spell started at the beginning of January 2021 the house humidity level fell to 30% for a few days but when it started raining again levels slowly increased. Today they reached 43%. In summer humidity levels can easily reach 70%.
My piano is twenty five years old and of late has been able to retain its tune for about twelve months. Last year my tuner couldn't call and the piano had to wait about sixteen months before being retuned. The pitch had held up but the unisons were quite untidy. This was at the end of August last year and I am now beginning to think that a few notes are beginning to fall out of tune.

[G3och]

Do you think its a wait it out scenario over the next 12 months. I don't know if used pianos still adapt to their environment to get that tuning stability like brand new ones do. It has been in someone's house played or unplayed for the last 11 years though.

[chrisw]

I don't understand what you are suggesting waiting for. If you are asking if you should wait 12 months to allow a used piano to acclimatise before getting it tuned I would advise that is much longer than is needed. Once humidity has risen above 40% towards the end of winter wait three or four weeks and then have it tuned. In my opinion the only time to avoid tuning is immediately before the start of winter when cold weather can be expected to drop humidity levels quickly. This is just my feeling, I am not a piano technician.
Tuning stability may only be developed after two or more tunings if your piano hasn't been tuned for many years.
To my mind humidity swings between 39-52% are not terribly large provided it is not on a weekly cycle. If the cycles are shorter than a week I would doubt if moisture take up or release in timber would be able to keep pace but I am always prepared to be surprised.

[G3och]

Ahh i think that might of been where i went wrong. I had it tuned and then a week later we had the massive storm and the blizzard!