UK Piano Page Piano Discussion Forums

WinstonChurchill

They are of course wrong, as I am about to demonstrate. However:

My piano is about to be relocated from a carpeted room into a room with hardwood flooring.

Can anyone suggest a good way to avoid putting dents in the floor once the piano is in situ? I assume that those crappy little cup things you get from the hardware store for putting under the sofa won't be any good, seeing as this is a 520lb piano we're talking about.

Some glenn-gouldian wooden blocks suggest themselves, but I also don't want to raise the piano too far off the floor if I can help it. Surely there's some product out there somewhere for just this purpose?

Thanks!

Brumtuner · Persistent Poster Joined: 08 Feb 2008 Posts: 80

This 'hardwood flooring', is it balsa?

mdw · Persistent Poster Joined: 05 Jan 2008 Posts: 191

As 3 fat blokes sitting on a sofa will weigh more than that, sofa castor cups will be fine. Get ones with the flat base and a felt pad on the underside. Most diy sheds do them.

Grenache · Posted: Mon Jun 09, 2008 1:23 pm Post subject:

There are some avaliable via the Piano Accessories pages on this site, though I haven't tried any.

genaa · Posted: Mon Jun 09, 2008 4:57 pm Post subject:

failing that you can always use larger tiles of hardwood laminate type material, or combination with some carpet tile etc. cut to whatever size you feel appropriate.

PianoFifty · Regular Poster Joined: 21 Jun 2005 Posts: 37 Location: UK

At 520lbs this must be a small grand. Sofa castor cups WON'T do the job (they will most likely be too small and break).

I use some offcuts of 15mm softwood. Works fine. I have 'hardwood' floors, and without support the piano castors would dent them for sure.
_________________
All the right notes, but not necessarily in the right order......

mdw · Persistent Poster Joined: 05 Jan 2008 Posts: 191

WinstonChurchill · Posted: Tue Jun 10, 2008 9:19 am Post subject:

Thanks all.

It is in fact a U3, which apparently weighs 517lbs.

Barrie Heaton · Posted: Tue Jun 10, 2008 6:04 pm Post subject:

vernon · Moderator Joined: 12 Mar 2008 Posts: 80 Location: scotland

cut 4 neat 3" squares from an offcut of the hardwood flooring.
You can insert these( and remove them) by leaning the piano the required way without lifting.
If you are not handy enough, ask the tuner to make them!

Otto · Posted: Tue Jun 24, 2008 10:29 am Post subject:

This is a top tip, and is much better than castor cups as it spreads the load over a much greater area. I normally nail or glue a couple of extra pieces of moulding to stop the casters running off the board.

You can use this for any piano on carpets too. I normally use 12mm plywood boards (6" x 6" for a grand piano) and paint it the same colour as the carpet. I suppose you could just cover it with a carpet off-cut instead.

When I moved house, my 7' 2" Bechstein left indents in the carpet which recovered back to normal in about a week.

If the floor is solid oak or beech, you're quite safe not bothering with the castor stuff at all, since the woods are so hard.
_________________
Otto