wood salvaged from pianos?

[Charlie North]

There seems to be a piano offered free on CL in my area pretty much weekly.


Are they worth grabbing to salvage the wood?

[Myk Rian]

Depends on the piano. Might be a cheap one with pressed wood, or a grand with solid wood. You would have to look at it yourself.
If nothing else, the sound board should be worth something in scrap value.

[Bob Aquino]

Its a lot of work to go through for what may be mostly plywood. Most of what makes a piano look good is veneer with not that many pieces of solid wood and what is there may be a lesser species. There is a solid piece of sitka spruce, but what are you going to do with it, its not very thick. And then you have that lovely cast iron harp which is most of the weight of the piano with all that tension from the strings. If its old enough you could take the ivory off the keys though I dont know what use it would be except for recovering other piano keys. If you have a lot of time on your hands and a freebie old piano, have fun, but keep your expectations down.

[Doug Shepard]

If it's an older one, it might have real ivory and/or ebony for the keys. The pieces would be small but it might be worthwhile for small inlays. Most of the older ones I've owned had solid mahogany for much of the larger pieces but you'd have to work around numerous holes which would limit the size of what you could salvage.

[Richard M. Wolfe]

I moved a piano once. Just once. On that basis my answer would be no. But even if you got some good wood out of it look at the rest of it you're stuck getting rid of.

[Charlie North]

Thanks for talking me out of that.

I'll stick to oak pallets.

[Adam Grills]

I posted on another forum.

I seem to be a collector of intruments for some reason http://forum.canadianwoodworking.com/images/smilies/confused.gif Don't really play any. I have a 1820's piano (wooden sound board and short key board) that I am restoring. I am missing some ivory http://forum.canadianwoodworking.com/images/smilies/frown.gif Not interested in plastic in restoration.

Wondering if there are any music buffs that can confirm/ tell me the date that they stoppped putting ivory on keys? I remembering someone telling me 1950.

[Bob Luciano]

I did it once before I got into woodworking because I like the veneer and hell it was free. Well not sure what shape your back is in but the one I had must have weighed about 600lbs maybe a bit more. I might do it again but I really hope someone talks me out of it.

[Doug Shepard]

FWIW somebody on one of the WW forums took a salvaged grand or baby grand a couple years ago, stood it upright, and turned it into a very cool armoire or cabinet of some sort. There's other options than just sawing it up into the usable wood.

[Jim O'Dell]

I've always wanted to take an old upright player/grand and make a computer desk out of it. Might even be able to set a full sized electronic keyboard in it. But I also wonder how much useful wood you would get. Jim.