played outside in 55 degree TX weather:–cracks in the finish?

[sandra-salstrom]

I played a 5pm outdoor Houston, Texas wedding today (Dec 27) on a sunny 55 degree day. And at the end of the gig, I looked down at the soundboard of my rebuilt Salvi Aurora to see lots of cracks in the finish. I was shocked. Weather.com says the humidity outside is about 60% (just 4 hours later)

Not windy. People were cold but the bride and bridesmaids were sleeveless and just fine. I wore just a sweater. Plus I let the harp become acclimated to the temperature before I took the cover off.

[Karen Johns]

Hmmmm….I can take a stab at this one, but hopefully a professional pedal harp builder (like Carl) will jump in with a better educated explanation. First, a couple of questions. What temperature was the harp at originally? Was the soundboard exposed to direct sunlight? When your harp was rebuilt, did they put a brand new soundboard in it?

Here’s what I think might have caused this: If the soundboard was originally at 70 degrees or so, then cooled to 55, then- if exposed to direct sunlight-heated up again (while the interior of the soundboard stayed at 55 or so) this could have caused the finish to contract and expand over a short period of time, causing the crackling.

Alternatively, if the builder did not replace the soundboard when they rebuilt your harp this crackling may be the result of aging, and you may not have noticed it before now. The brighter surroundings made the finish show up more.

Oddly, though, I’ve taken my harp out in cool temps (30’s, with a light cover) to warm temps (70’s) with vast humidity changes in transport and not had anything like this happen. It could very well be the type of finish on your harp.

I’m so sorry this happened to your baby I hope you can get him (her?) fixed.

Karen

[sandra-salstrom]

I kept the harp room temperature low (in the 60s) before I took the harp out.
As far as sunlight, I put myself in a shaded area though there may have been a little sun on the harp. Your hypothesis may be correct because it was just one side of the soundboard that really had lots of hairline cracks. So maybe there was some sun on that side.

And yes, the soundboard was rebuilt along with the harp back in 2001.

And no, there were no cracks before the gig. The reason I know is because I played a similar outdoor wedding last weekend and saw some hairline cracks in the finish on the other side of the soundboard which absolutely astounded me and I thought “hmm, the sunlight must be exposing them… I just never saw them before, good thing there’s only two”. Well, I guess the same thing must have happened then only with less effect. Maybe because last weekend was a windy day which lessened the effect of the sun?????

[Karen Johns]

Could be the wind may have kept the temperature down where the soundboard was exposed to the sun. However, I would ask the person who replaced the soundboard what kind of finish they used. It doesn’t seem right that there should be such

[Sid Humphreys]

Carl Swanson, where are you with a possible answer?

[sandra-salstrom]

Hi Karen,
Thanks for your concern. It was about a 20 minute ceremony and I tuned and played 30 mins before so I’d say about 1 hour at most that I had the harp out in the weather.

[Ida Slapta]

The first question I have is “why were you and your harp out in 55 degree weather in the first place?!” I couldn’t even think of playing anything that required any technique at that temperature. As for your harp, I have always heard that right around 50 degrees is when bad things can happen. For the time being the damage is probably only cosmetic (keep and eye on it), I would recommend a clause in your contract with temperature limits. My personal low limit is 65 degrees.

[carl-swanson]

Sandra- I’d have to see it to give an accurate opinion as to what’s going on. How old is the harp? And is there any way of finding out what kind of finish is on the cracked area now? Is it an epoxy finish? Salvi used that kind of finish for a while, but it tended to fracture and was absolutely unrepairable so they changed to something else.

Regardless of the temperature or humidity, if you were sitting in bright sun, then maybe that side of the harp really heated up, causing the problem.

[sandra-salstrom]

Hi Carl–thanks for checking this.
The harp was originally put together in 1981 in CA by Dale Barco, then rebuilt in 2001 by Venus Harps. Actually, the sun wasn’t really bright and there wasn’t much beaming through to my area (I was in a semi shaded area). As I think about it, the sun was going down and more behind me… but that’s not to say there was no sun at all on the harp; also, the scenario might have changed during the ceremony (I was just watching for mothers, bridesmaids, the bride…etc.). I

[sandra-salstrom]

Well, I checked the humidity and temperature here at home and it’s consistently 60% RH or a little below and 60-70 degrees in the house. I’ll have to find out about the finish.

[Sid Humphreys]

Sandra,

As a fellow Texan I should point out to you that the humidity will change as the use of your heater and AC change. When you run the heater during a cold front the humidity level

[fay-marie-reinhardt]

Its also worth checking the accuracy of your hygrometer. There is information on the internet how to do this test.

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