Pin Block Repair

I recently inspected a piano with a birdcage action. The customer was very excited to get it working. I told her it would never work great. She understood.

I gave her an estimate and she agreed on a schedule. Then I opened the top and saw one of the largest pin block frame seperations I've ever seen. This is the separation after a no glue repair.

I gave her the price for that and she said go ahead. I've seen pin block repairs before that were not glued and decided to try the no-glue repair on this piano. There were eight holes for bolts so that was good.

I measured and tried to get bolts that were just long enough. I did not want to start grinding bolts off. I decided to have the bolts go out the back but you could do it the other way around. We will add a piece of wood trim to stop the bolt ends from scratching the wall.

One pin was very close to the bolt. I had to remove the pin, insert the bolt, and re-insert the pin.

After bolting, we added CA glue because the pins were loose. Now we're tuning it up to see how high she can go. A tone flat and already one bass string broke. The customer was made aware of that possibility. The goal is to get it so that each note is working and she can play the piano and it sounds as musical as possible. Sometimes we have to remember that we are servicing the customer and not just the piano.