Still 'ere!

Hello again. No, I'd not died and given up the ghost. I've had lots of other things going on this year that have sadly meant that the piano has had to take a back seat. However, it's going to be getting more attention very soon.

I was hoping to be able to keep the keytops for both the black and the white keys but after lots of deliberating I decided that it wasn't going to give me the finish I was aspiring for so I took the white ones off. They came off very easily and in one piece too. I did the usual eBay thing and came up with a full set of brand new off-white keytops with change out of £30 including delivery. Needless to say I was pleased!

The black keys are another issue...

I did spray them as it shows in a much earlier post but after a few months it became clear that it wasn't going to be acceptable. I don't mind that, I'm glad it turned out to not be right before I'd put the piano back together again!!!

We had a burst water pipe in the garage the other day which is where this piano and my smaller 6ft Kawai grand are both being stored at present. We were terrified to open the garage door. The temperature had been down to minus 17 and was consistently around there for about two weeks. Loads of pipes in the area were freezing up. Now, I wasn't worried about the pianos in the garage as they're extremely well insulated specifically because of where they are but I'd not born a burst pipe in mind. When the postman knocked on the door saying "I don't want to be the bearer of bad news but there's water pouring out of your garage" we both thought that the pianos had had it. We were SO LUCKY you'd not believe it. Yes, the pipe had burst. Yes it was right beside the piano but it had burst in the complete opposide direction to where either of the pianos were and was just running almost directly under the garage door. Obviously, it was spraying off the wall a bit but the pianos were both as dry as a bone. It was then that I thought that I've got to get on with this project.

2011 is the year this piano gets finished... I hope!

Novelty toys

Once again, it has been a very long time since I last updated what I've been upto. I'm only doing it to keep you keen. What's the old saying? "Treat 'em mean, and keep em clean".

The piano is still moving forward but purely through my fault it's doing so extremely slowly. I'm sort of caught between two separate phases and am sort of taking a breather from the first part as it was particularly labour intensive but also sucking my teeth and rubbing my chin a bit before I start on the next part as I'm not entirely certain how to do it as yet so haven't started until I'm sure.

I've now sorted the bridge out, it is entirely free of varnish and had all of the wipeawayable stuff duly wiped away. I've filled the holes with an epoxy glue where the pins go before I start to replace them. That's where I'm stalling a bit. I've not ordered the correct sized pins to go back in so far so will really have to pull my finger out as they say.

However, the more pressing point is to have the frame regilded. Steve has now made the pin block and is moderately keen to get it back into the frame so he can clear it out of his workshop. Fair enough. BUT, to get it regilded, I need to get in touch with someone who can actually come and not only do the job but do a very good job. I know there's someone very nearby who should be up to the task though so it's purely laziness on my part that it hasn't been done.

I'll have to reface the face of the bridge with carbon. I've got the carbon (not easy to obtain) so will just have to apply it. Should be easy enough from what I can work out. it seems that the hardest part of dealing with it is making a neat job of the application. Hopefully I'll not quite have the DTs when I do it!