Wonder Woman and her Wonderful Life: Refinishing a Baby Grand Piano

Since this blog serves only as our family journal, I'm going to give you the quick tour of refinishing a baby grand piano. First, you'll need a friend who is throwing a baby grand piano to the curb. She will have picked it up from her neighbor, who was throwing it to the curb, years ago. We don't know why there is no love for this particular instrument, but it's all subjective. We saw a diamond in the rough. Some days were rougher than others, but in the end, a diamond nonetheless.

We decided to skip the drama of finding 5 friends who wanted to move a piano and we paid 3 professionals to do it for us. Since we made that investment, I made the executive decision to have it put in the living room so I wouldn't have to find 5 friends later to move it from the garage into the house. That being said, please understand that we refinished a baby grand piano INSIDE our home. If I tell you there were 3 inches of sanding dust everywhere, you'll understand I mean everywhere. In the basement, in the food, on the dishes, hanging from the ceiling, resting atop the shower curtain rod. Everywhere. I'm not saying it was a bad decision, but next time...

Scott is the furniture maestro in our home. He loves finishing furniture. There are only a handful of item which we own that he did not finish, so he did this lovingly, for his children. All of them love to play the piano. Four of them are officially taking lessons and #5 insists on playing for our piano teacher, every week, a piece of her own making. She understands that she has to read before she can take lessons. She also understands that everyone is going to hear her play, regardless.

Back to the piano. Scott began this project after his classes finished in late September. The deadline was December 18th when a Christmas Piano Recital would be held in our home. I chipped in there at the end with the varnish as his next MBA term had begun and he was a little pressed for time. He did an incredible job and we love him for all he does for our family. This little beauty is just icing on that particular cake.

Moving Day

Yes, in that corner, please.

Watching the Load-in from the Cheap Seats

The legs are removed and it's lifted wherever you want it to go.

We were amazed and couldn't wait to play.

Welcome Home Baby Grand!

Step 1: Take the Piano Apart
Once the action (keyboard) slides out and the lids and covers come off,
you are left with the harp. The very dirty harp.
We had a generous piano tuner come out to tune it before we went to work on it.
He was so helpful with direction and tips... and even more so when we went to put it back together!

Step 2: Cleaning
When I say this piano was dirty, you'll understand I mean "caked on for 72 years dirty."
Thus the shop vac and compressor. I mean dirty.

How do you clean a baby grand?
With Q-tips!
The coat hanger with a rag on the end of it was helpful, but the swabs were money.
See how black they are? One swab lasts about 30 seconds, but you find golden shiny
underneath the black. The swabs fit nicely between the strings too.

Look what I found under the dirt!
A Kimball logo replete with all of their industry awards.
Our tuner, who shall remain "Steve," told us that we are the proud owners of a
1939 Kimball Baby Grand Piano.
We're alright with that!

(No hammers were broken in the refinishing of this piano. Wahoo!)

The section on the right before Q-tip scrubbing.
The section on the left after Q-tip scrubbing.
Now you'll never clean your ears without music playing in your head.

The sanding begins.
Each part of the instrument has to be removed and sanded down on it it's own.
My only regret is that we didn't keep track of how much sandpaper it took to finish the job.

He's sanding. And until he was about an hour into it, it didn't occur
to me to cover the rest of our lives with plastic.
That night I used the shop vac to find my couch.
(Guess what our next new addition to the family will be? Yes, a couch.)

#1 helping Daddy while he catches an SEC play one Saturday.
Awesome teamwork on this project.

That sanding dirt I mentioned...no joke.
It was (and some of it still is) everywhere.

One naked piano, all sanded down and ready for...
more cleaning.

We decided that I could clean while Scott worked with the stain
to save time. That is now a Christmas tree in the background, not a pumpkin.

The New Stain
See that naked left leg there? This part of the transformation was really cool to see.

Staining the Bench
Not one drop on the carpet. The man is a genius.

We love the stain. It's called Jacobean.
Our first choice was a little too red. Scott and I hem-hawed over it
for weeks. Finally one day I asked #1 and she said, "Take it back!"
In the spirit of family unity, we took it back. Such a great decision.

The music stand with new stain and a coat of varnish.
If only you could see the pencil holding the music stand upright from the back.
A missed photo op.

Parts and pieces receiving their varnish treatment
and necessary dry time. I'm telling you, for a solid week we did
nothing, but varnish & sand, varnish & sand, varnish...

Is that one coat of varnish or two?
I can't remember.

Everything stopped for the piano.
School actually took a Christmas break because the lid
had to be varnished indoors for the heat. And for our lungs, of course.

Housecleaning and cooking also stopped in order to reach our deadline.
I pulled one all-nighter - a term I haven't used since college - to get the final coat
on the lid. It is purdy. If I had the patience, I'd put a 4th and 5th coat on it.
(I don't.)

Action Shot!
(#1 behind the camera.)

I call this shot "life in spite of the piano." There were pieces of it everywhere.
The action sat on the pool table for months while I prayed no one
would fall on the hammers.

Time to put it all back together.
Just 4 screws and a little tension hold the keyboard and hammers in.

Action is back in.
My favorite shot would have been me pulling the plastic from the carpet
while Scott lifted the piano above me. That photo happened way past bedtime one night
so we'll have to just keep that memory tucked away in our minds. Neither one of us
could manage the camera too.