A coffee-stained piano used by the Beatles at London's Abbey Road studios is expected to sell for more than STG100,000 ($A172,562).
The battered Challen upright piano, covered in cigarette burns and coffee stains, can be heard on hits such as Paperback Writer and Tomorrow Never Knows, both recorded in Abbey Road's Studio Three in 1966.
The piano also features on Pink Floyd's 1973 Dark Side of the Moon LP.
"I think it is the first instrument from the Abbey Road studios to come on the open market," says Stephen Maycock, the consultant specialist for Beatles memorabilia at Bonhams auction house.
Stains, cigarette burns
"The piano has had quite a few knocks. It's had coffee cups placed on it and it's got cigarette burns," he added.
"It's a working instrument that was used pretty much every day of its working life, and it's got the scars to prove it.
"But it still plays well and sounds great."
The instrument retired from service in the 1980s and is now set to be sold at auction at the Vintage Goodwood festival in West Sussex, southeast England, on August 15.
Bonhams expects the piano to fetch between STG100,000 ($A172,562) and STG150,000 ($A258,843).
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