Pianoland...Piano Moving


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	More extensive reference sections on piano care



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If you have to put your piano in storage...
Pianos, like people, prefer safe and cozy homes, away from drafts, dampness and rodents. Putting a piano into storage usually means moving it from a comfortable house to a cold and drafty warehouse. Even if the facility is advertised as "climate-controlled," it's rarely as well-regulated as a home. The more variable the temperature and humidity, the faster a piano deteriorates.
If you must store your piano, try to find a friend to keep it for you. Ideally, someone in the "foster home" will play the piano and agree to have it serviced periodically by a technician of your choice.
Unheated personal storage units are not suitable places to store pianos for any length of time.
A well-built garage can be an acceptable option for short term storage (up to one year), if you take some precautions:
1.	Check the buildings' drainage. Make sure the floor under the piano will never be damp.
2.	Is the building weather-tight? There should be no dew on the inside of the windows on a cool rainy day.
3.	Ask your technician to install a climate control system in the piano. Make sure it stays plugged into an electrical outlet.
4.	Cover the piano with heavy blankets.
5.	Arrange to have it regularly inspected for rodent infestation.

By far the best way to move a piano is to hire a professional piano grand piano

mover. This eliminates the risk of damage to you or your piano during the moving process. Pianos range in weight from 300 lbs. for a small spinet up to 1000 lbs. for a concert grand. Although it may look easy, piano moving, even from room to room can be very dangerous. If you decide to hire a professional get a recommendation from your technician or local music store. The most important thing to remember is to make sure the mover is insured, so any accidental damage will be covered.

If you insist on moving your piano yourself, please review the guidelines below and make sure you have plenty of strong help.

Safely moving a piano around your house

Most of the weight of an upright is located toward the back, making it prone to tipping over backwards. When moving it out from the wall, never allow anyone, especially children, to stand behind the piano. Most pianos have small metal casters that are only meant for occasional small moves, such as rolling the piano a few feet on a smooth floor. Pianos that are moved often, such as those in concert halls, schools, or churches, are almost always mounted on steel dollies with large rubber wheels to prevent leg and caster damage.

Here are some tips for safely moving your piano in your home:

Grand Pianos

· Close the lid and fallboard.
· Check to see that the legs are secure.
· Check for clearance under the pedal lyre throughout the move, especially over door thresholds.
· Keep kids and pets clear.
· After removing belt buckles, rings, or anything that could scratch the finish, position three people around the piano, one near each leg.
· If the piano is on a carpet, be very careful to avoid straining the legs. It's not necessary to lift the piano off the floor, but just to take some weight off the casters so they will roll more easily.
· If the floor has obstacles like thresholds or furnace grates, lift each leg over one at a time, using extra help if necessary. This is very important. Never force a piano over a bump in the floor. The caster could catch and the leg might break off.
· Keep your back straight, and lift with your legs!
· All movers should be encouraged to speak up if they notice a problem, but one person should be firmly in charge.

Upright Pianos

· Read all the cautions for moving grand pianos.
· Look for moving handles at each end in the back. Not all pianos have these.
· Use two people, one at each end of the piano (two at each end for large uprights), and always lift the casters over bumps in the floor.
· Most spinet and console pianos have thin unsupported front legs. These pianos should be moved with extra care, since the legs are easily broken if caught in a crack or dragged across soft carpeting. To avoid damage, carefully tip the piano back slightly as you roll it to reduce weight on the front legs.

Does a piano need tuning after it is moved?

It depends. The piano is a complex instrument, with over 200 individual strings and thousands of moving parts. Each string must be painstakingly adjusted to put the piano in tune. Even the tiniest change in a string's tension can be heard by a practiced ear. You might think, then, that trucking a piano down the highway or even rolling it down a hall could "knock it out of tune." However, pianos are actually quite tough. They're built to withstand up to 20 tons of string tension and decades of heavy usage, so the physical movement of a piano usually has very little effect on its tuning or other adjustments.

It's the climate change associated with the move, rather than the actual move itself, that makes pianos go out of tune. A substantial difference in humidity between its previous location and its new home will change the shape of the piano's soundboard, changing tension on the strings. For instance, a well-tuned piano moved fifty miles from a heated, dry apartment to a cool, humid home will sound fine immediately after the move. But a week later, after adjusting to the higher humidity, the piano will sound out of tune. Even moving a piano from one room to another in the same building can affect it if heating or air-conditioning patterns are different.

So, do you have to tune your piano after moving it? Pianos need periodic tuning anyway, whether they are moved or not, so it's likely that a piano that has just been moved was already due for tuning before the move. If so, it's best to let the piano adjust to its new environment for a week or two, then have it tuned. On the other hand, if the piano had been recently tuned before the move, you might just hold off and see how the piano sounds after a few weeks. If the climate of the new location is similar to the old, your piano will probably sound fine until its next regular service date.