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Restoration

Brought Back Stage by Stage, in the Workshop

A restoration starts with a visit and a written estimate. The piano only comes to the workshop once you have agreed to it.

Estimate
Free, after a visit
Takes
3 to 6 months
Afterwards
Two free tunings

The method

How a Piano Is Restored

  1. A visit, and a written estimate.

    Ida plays the piano, takes the action out where it stands and writes down what it needs, in the order it would be done, with a price for each stage.

  2. The piano comes to the workshop.

    Moved by a piano mover, never by us; the cost is on the estimate.

  3. The action comes out first.

    Every key, hammer and damper is taken out, cleaned and checked, and every worn part is listed before anything is replaced.

  4. Hammers, dampers and bushings.

    The felt parts that wear, reshaped where they can be and replaced where they cannot.

  5. Strings and tuning pins, if the piano needs them.

    New wire throughout, bass strings wound here to match the old scale, pins one size up to grip a tired plank.

  6. Soundboard and bridges, for the pianos that need the most.

    Cracks shimmed and the board re-crowned, or a new board fitted.

  7. Regulation and voicing.

    Every key set to the same depth and the same touch, and every hammer voiced so the piano sounds even from bottom to top.

  8. Three tunings before it leaves.

    New strings stretch, so the piano is tuned, left, and tuned again until it holds.

Where the sound comes from

Grooves in the Felt

Every time a key is played, the hammer strikes its strings, and after years of that the strings cut grooves into the felt. A grooved hammer sounds hard and thin, however well the piano is tuned. Light grooves are filed out and the felt reshaped; deep ones mean new hammers, glued and fitted one at a time.

Hammer felt comes in three weights, and the weight is chosen for the piano and the room it lives in, not for the catalogue. A small upright in a flat gets a softer felt than a grand in a school hall.

Two piano hammers side by side in profile. On the left a worn hammer with three grooves cut into the felt by the strings; on the right the same hammer reshaped, its felt rounded again. Both sit on a wooden moulding on a thin shank. Grooves Felt Moulding Shank Worn, as it came in Reshaped, round again
Fig. 2 A hammer before and afterProfile, about twice size

Prices

What Restoration Costs

  • Regulation, uprightfrom 2,400 DKKOften done in the home over a long afternoon.
  • Regulation, grandfrom 3,800 DKK
  • Action rebuild, uprightfrom 16,000 DKKNew hammers, dampers and bushings, regulated and voiced.
  • Action rebuild, grandfrom 28,000 DKK
  • Full restoration, uprightfrom 48,000 DKKAction, strings, pins, soundboard work and the case.
  • Full restoration, grandfrom 95,000 DKK

Every estimate is free and written after a visit. A third is paid when the piano arrives at the workshop and the rest when it goes home, tuned three times and with two more tunings free in its first year.

Said plainly

What the Workshop Won't Take On

  • Digital and electronic pianos. Nothing here has a circuit board.
  • Painting over original veneer to hide wear. The wood is cleaned and polished instead.
  • Pianos with a cracked iron frame. It cannot be welded safely, and you will be told so on the first visit.
  • Moving pianos. A piano mover does that, and the cost is on the estimate.
  • Restorations that would cost more than the piano will ever be worth to you, without saying so first.

Restored pianos that are already finished are for sale in the workshop.

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