RIP You are never satisfied, @CyberGene are you? 🙂
You are probably spending too much time with @eddiepiano these days 🤣 (no offense intended Eddie, if anything that is actually a compliment for being a perfectionist -- as I am in fact myself)

None taken. 🙂

Yes, I am guilty of being a perfectionist and having high demands on the pianos I might purchase. That is one of the reasons I often doubt buying a very old restored german pianos that I like touch- and tonewise. To me the pianos between 1900 and 1940 from brands like Bechstein, Blüthner, August Förster and Grotrian-Steinweg often sound richer and more mature and offer a more sensitive touch compared to post-wwII pianos while being more affordable, taller and sometimes more beautiful with art cases. But I am often skeptical about the rebuilding process and the quality of the process and the materials used. Some piano builders/shops I asked about what has been done to the pianos answer defensive or vague, as if I am nosy rather than interested in what has been rebuilt by whom and what materials were used. It is no secret that many German piano builders send their pianos to Poland to let them rebuilt there. And while these pianos often look good on the outside, many aspects of the construction aren't taken carefully into consideration, like the geometry of the original action, the size and weight of the original hammers, the Stegdruck (bride pressure!?) the scale and many other things. And because the quality of the rebuilt piano largely depends on the skill and care of the rebuilder and the materials used I am very careful about buying a rebuilt piano especially on the private market, because often it is not even known what already had been done when and by whom.

When searching the internet for piano I discovered the Klavieratelier, a piano shop by piano technician Tobias J. Schmidt in Lychen, around 80 km north of Berlin. The restored upright and grand pianos look great, although I was a bit skeptical because he also restored many Danish pianos besides the famous german pianos like Bechstein, Steinway, Blüthner and so on. Then I discovered that he has an amazing youtube channel where he offers insight in his exemplary, very careful and perfectionist work and restoration process as well as in many little inventions he use to make the restoration process more efficient and consistent. Despite being in german, only having uploaded 27 videos and covering such a niche cover he has 18400 subscribers. I already watched many german and english piano rebuilders, but none of them impressed me so much like him with his incredible knowledge and craftmanship. The videos are very well made and got better in quality with the years. He has video series of rebuilding an Upright, a Steinway B, a Blüthner Model 6, a Yamaha SC (250cm Yamaha Grand from the 50s) and a short of an August Förster. I can't recommend these enough for anyone interested in pianos.

For the newer videos there are englisch subtitles. For the older unfortunately not, but maybe the auto translation works. It's really worth to watch all videos, because he often focuses on different aspects of his work and his equipment in the videos. The Yamaha SC videos are very interesting because it has been already rebuilt once and many things went wrong.

Steinway B

Upright

Blüthner

Yamaha SC

August Förster

This is the piano technician I would (and will) trust when buying or restoring a piano. I already contacted him and will visit him in the beginning of August. 🙂