The Full-Day Piano Service: A Quick Rundown

Have you ever suddenly realized that the room you’ve been sitting in is way too hot? Or suddenly realize you are hungry and probably have been for a while. Sometimes it takes our conscious brain a while to catch up to subtle changes in the way we feel.

With pianos, if something suddenly goes wrong, it is often immediately apparent: a key stops working, or dampers ring forever, or the pedal squeaks. The decision to pick up the phone and have someone come out and look at the issue is an easy one, and the pain point simple to identify.

As pianos age, accompanying subtle changes often require us as musicians to (often subconsciously) put more effort into making the piano sound good. In grand pianos, compression and wear of felt parts throughout the piano mechanism cause alignment problems in the hammers. Slight warping in the wooden parts in all pianos can cause piano hammers to gain extra friction, or strike the strings incorrectly or not at all. Keys can begin to feel significantly heavier, and fine control is often lost. 

In my personal day-to-day experience, there are a few big difference-making services that pianos commonly need in addition to regular tuning that people don’t realize are changing the quality of how they play. If I had to rank them, I would say the top three in order of how common they are are:

Common Grand Piano Problems

1. It becomes difficult to play quietly, usually because the hammers have sunk into their rest felt and are too far from the strings. They need to be returned to the proper specification

2. Some notes feel heavier than others. Since people play certain notes more often, adjustments to the spacing of certain action parts are needed to balance that wear. This makes quick arpeggios or scales, and music involving them much easier to play

3. Pressing the keys does not feel smooth; there are subtle jumps or bounces that make it hard to play precisely. These bounces can have a few causes, but are almost always one of maybe three specs related to the timing of the lifting of the damper when the note is pressed

Common Upright Piano Problems

1. Keys begin to feel loose, that is to say, sometimes you need to press the key down a long ways before it begins to engage and give resistance at all, which destroys the sense of precision and touch in the piano.

1. Some notes feel heavier than others. Fairly similar to grand pianos in this respect. In uprights, the distance the hammer has a allowed to jump back after hitting the string will slowly increase over time, making it difficult to play quick passages.

2. Hammers double-strike, hitting the strings multiple times on soft strikes, and it feels at least as annoying as it sounds. Often related to the weather and usually easily fixed. A client who notes which keys are doing this will help any technician immensely to prevent them in the future, since sometimes the problem will stop before the technician gets to the piano.

People will sometimes tell me “I’m no concert pianist, so it’s ok if the piano doesn’t play like a concert instrument.”  It is pretty normal for any piano, after a period of 10 years or more, to need adjustments in order to keep the moving parts in prime working condition. 

For issues like this, often you can do a lot in a few hours, so we quote either a 2 hour tuning appointment or a 4 hour service appointment, and there is a lot of value that can be packed into that time. Usually which option is the best depends on the overall condition of the piano.

So, when is a full-day service the right call?

The truth of the answer is like so many things, it depends. Like our other services, we price them to pay for our time, and the cost for the service is close to the equivalent of a full regular day of tunings, we try and keep this service as competitive as possible, and it is where our training and expertise get the chance to really help your piano reach its potential.

If you are interested in the kinds of things we look at in the course of a full-day service, here are some of things that we look at in the course of a full-day service:

Piano Keys:

Most piano keys have two main friction points, in the middle on the center pin, and on the end, where there is a metal capstan that slides along a felt piece attached to the bottom of the piano action. The goal is to minimize friction at both points. The center pin should have minimal play side to side but not be too tight, and the metal capstans are polished, with powder lubricant applied to the felt it touches as well. Additionally, keys can become misaligned, sit crooked,  too high or too low. These will be adjusted in the course of the appointment.

Piano Hammers:

The screws may need to be tightened and the hammers spaced to be centered precisely on the strings. Occasionally one might need to adjust the angle of the hammers if they acquire a diagonal slant in their upward motion. In older pianos, it is very common for the hammers to sit too far away from the strings when at rest. This comes from compression in soft parts throughout the mechanism, and leads to difficulty playing quietly, as on soft key presses the hammers will not come up far enough to make any sound.

Springs:

Each note usually possesses one or two springs in the dampers (in uprights), and in the repetition mechanism (grands) these springs should all respond with equal strength, and any outliers should be adjusted.

Dampers:

Dampers should begin to engage when the hammer has travelled about halfway to the string. If the dampers engage too soon, the keys will feel heavy. If the dampers engage too late, they will interfere with the “second keyboard,” the feeling of release that accompanies the hammer stopping just short of the strings. There should be a total cessation of sound once the damper touches the string: no squeaks or “zinging” sounds.

Voicing:

If one note plays more quietly than its neighbors or has a much different tone quality, it may be investigated if the hammer is hitting all of its strings evenly, and angles adjusted. The felt of the offending hammer may be conditioned or shaped as well to improve tone.

Piano Action:

The rest of the piano mechanism will also likely need adjustments, and it is here that the timing of hammer release from the strings, and how far the hammer falls back, is controlled. If these are not even, then it will become difficult to play quickly, as each note will require a different amount of force in order to make sound. In the extremes, if the jack (the part of a piano action that pushes up the hammer) is too far forwards, than the note will occasionally fail to play as the jack will slip out before the hammer is fully in motion .  If it is too far back, than it will not slip out, and the hammer will either bobble multiple times against the strings, or get stuck against them. Both jack and whippen (the hinge point where the key meets the action) need to be checked at their hinge points  for a consistent amount of friction. 

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Whew, that is a lot of info!!!!!

What, you are still reading after all that?

Well, if you made it this far, then you may be asking, so what? If I get all this work done, what does this actually do for my piano? 8 hours is a lot to pay for, if my piano plays ok as is. Is that improvement really worth the money, especially if I am not a professional pianist myself?

This is a bit tricky, and the best answer obviously depends on the circumstances of each piano. That being said, this kind of work really benefits pianos that were well-built, but have fallen in performance. For brand new pianos we quote work on a case-by-case basis, only very rarely quoting service for full-day. On the other end of the spectrum, we do not recommend the full-day service for pianos that need to be rebuilt, where damage has become so severe that more serious shop work is required in order to give any kind of value. Please call our office and our great office staff will be more than happy to advise you on the best fit for your particular piano.