Failure analysis of piano strings

In this paper we studied the failure cause of two types of piano strings. The numerous problems which make it difficult to quantify the string life are systematically analyzed. The strings in question, made of spring steel (cold drawn wires with different thickness), are bass strings and acute strings of a piano concert. SEM analysis and Energy dispersive X-ray analysis (EDS) were made. d questions were taken into account:• nnection of the string at the “tuning pin”; wear produced in its anchor point “agraffe”; nding in the compression points; vironment where the piano is located, the relative humidity and the strings corrosion phenomena that might trigger stress-corrosion cracking; rface finish of the cold drawn string. Besides these factors, it is necessary to consider the different tuning performed on a concert grand piano.