How do I maintain my piano?

Why control dryness & dampness?

Pianos are built primarily of wood, which is sensitive to extreme dryness, extreme dampness, and the changes between them. Colorado is generally dry, but we still see moisture swings season to season and even day to day — and that dryness is hard on pianos to begin with.

• Spring can bring higher humidity as the rains come and go.
• Summer swamp coolers cool air by passing it over water, often pushing indoor humidity to 60–80%.
• Winter heating dries the air further — many homes sit around 10–20% or less.

Wood swells when moist, crushing the grain; dryness shrinks it, stretching the grain. Wood has some elasticity, but after long exposure to this stress it can crack — especially the soundboard, the pin block, and the action parts. A cracked soundboard may not amplify well and can buzz; a cracked pin block causes loose tuning pins and an inability to hold a tuning.

What can I do about humidity?

Running air conditioning instead of a swamp cooler helps keep summer humidity lower; a whole-house furnace humidifier can raise winter levels a bit. But these are only part of the solution — A/C only lowers dampness while running, and winter humidifying is limited by outdoor temperature.

Avoiding damage

The Dampp-Chaser company's Piano Life-Saver System installs in your piano and holds the moisture level around 42% year-round. Because it's installed in (or under) the piano, it becomes a closed system that controls the piano's moisture without affecting the room. Ask us for more information.