Studio Visit to Repair a Roland EM-10 Keyboard

Today I visited a local (South-East London, UK) client’s studio to fix a key on a Roland EM-10 keyboard that wasn’t responding when pressed.

I removed all the screws from the back of the unit and opened it up to reveal the key bed.

I took the offending keys out and examined the keys, springs and circuit board contact points to find the cause of the problem.

The issue turned out to be a very small amount of dust on one of the graphite dots underneath the rubber pads which connect with the contacts as the key is pressed.

Wiping away the dust solved the problem. I replaced the parts and confirmed that the key now worked. Having checked over all the other keys on the keyboard, I found another unresponsive key. I took that apart, cleaned the dust, put it back together, then double-checked the entire keyboard. Everything now worked.

I reassembled the unit, replaced the casing screws and triple checked everything still working.

My client was happy to have his keyboard restored and that the whole job only took an hour. He was kind enough to leave me this nice review:

Many thank to Paul for sorting out a non-sounding key on my Roland keyboard. He also found another key that wasn’t working fully (that I hadn’t noticed) and fixed that too. It was all done in just over an hour. Absolutely first class service, at my home, as he lives nearby. He is such a friendly personable guy, and I have no hesitation in recommending him… you won’t be disappointed.