The restorers of “our” Bechstein piano, Courtney’s of Oxford, have provided this fascinating breakdown of work. Wow!
Strings, wrestpins, frame and soundboard.
- Unscrew & remove all existing damper-heads from strings.
- Destring frame, removing all existing strings, wrestpins and frame feltwork.
- Uplift, clean and refinish frame in antique gold lacquer.
- Rub down and polish soundboard, checking for any splits present (none so far) when frame uplifted.
- Clean & polish all frame bolts; refelt frame & refit to bracings.
- Drill out wrestpin holes and check wrestplank for splits (none present as far as can be seen).
- Fully restring & repin piano with EKA polished wire, and new set of EKA spun bass strings to patterns.
- Pitch-raise, tidy coils, level pins, ready for chip-tunings.
Action/Keyboard/Damper assembly.
- Send hammers to Abel in Germany to be recovered with new felts.
- Recentre four rows of flange-centres in action; two rows in damper-lever assembly.
- Clean Action, Keyboard & Damper assembly.
- Burnish jacks.
- Clean & polish ivory keytops N.B.
- Recover majority of feltwork in action & rebaize keyframe.
- Recover check leathers as required.
- Rebush keys as necessary.
- Recover damper-heads with new stitched and cut & shaped damper-felts.
Miscellaneous finishing work.
- Pitch-raise all strings, stretch twice and fine tune to a little sharp of A=440 to allow for slight settling in coming months.
- Carefully regulate the touch and dampers.
- Overhaul and clean pedal assembly and lyre.
Cabinetwork restoration.
- Strip off all existing degenerated lacquer from casework.
- Identify wood-veneer (we now know this is probably rosewood).
- Major repair to two of the three legs to reinstate the original threads.
- Rub down, minor repairs to damaged veneer as appropriate, and prepare for repolishing.
- Seal and lightly stain the wood.
- Hand refinish the casework in the traditional satin-waxed finish.
- Clean & polish the brasswork.
Assemble the piano, and final checks before arranging delivery back to Coventry.