One of my friends, bought an Arie de Keyser half set on eBay a few years ago, with both a fully keyed D concert and 2 or 3 keyed C flat chanter. He’s had it in his closet all this time, we got together yesterday to get it playing for the first time and to show him how to make a sound.
The chanters are very nice, and about all they need to get playing was to adjust the bridle and a little back D tape. They play right up through the high D, and a twist tie in the bell easily brought out the hard D.
Unfortunately, the bag, a generic sewn leather variety seems quite leaky. The stock and intake pipe are glued rather than tied in. I’d say it leaks about as much air as it takes to play the chanter. Pretty much unusuable for a beginner player. The bellows are fine.
I’ve advised him to get a new bag, but I really don’t know who to recommend to do the work.
Can y’all recommend someone who could install his existing bag hardware on a nice McHarg or L&M bag?
I have had my Joe Kennedy bag for about 10 months. Because I am a beginner and slowly learning the finer points of pressure control, I probably push it harder than I should. Suffice to say, my Kennedy bag is still air tight.
Because he is a Canadian vendor and the USD is so high right now, it might be worth your while to commission a bag from Joe.
You certainly can’t go wrong with a McHarg bag. I’ve been squeezing away on mine for 7 years and it is still absolutely air tight!! I don’t know if Mike seasons his bags or not, but I’ve done absolutely no maintenance on it at all and it still works great!
Bruce Childress uses McHarg bags in his sets. He tied in my small pipes stocks on a McHarg bag that I purchased to replace an oily, leaky bag that was giving me fits. Bruce did a grand job and only took about 20 minutes to complete the work.
While waiting for a replacement bag, your friend could try seasoning the existing one. I had a bag from Arie and found that seasoning was essential.
You can melt a knob of beeswax in hot cooking oil and blend till smooth (do I sound like Nigella?), pour into the bag while still hot and work it into the seams and any worn areas. I found the proportions by trial and error but I think it worked out about 50-50. The idea is to have a mix which pours while hot but gives a greasy paste when cold.
just to state what is probably obvious, Macharg is a full service pipe maker. i am sure that he would be happy to sew your stuff into a bag. he gives good service and delivers when he says he will
Hey everybody,
I have a question. I assume that it is possible to season bellows but how is this done? I have a small leak in on the the inseam of my bellows. It still works fine but I figure eventually I’ll have to fix it. Thanks
Joseph
Re: bellows leak
You can season or seal a minor leak by making a warm mix of beeswax and lard @ 3:1 ratio.Cork off outlet, remove inlet valve, pour in melted mixture, allow mixture to flow to leak, cork off inlet and squeeze bellows. Remove coks and get rid of excess mixture while warm. Allow to cool and replace inlet valve.
Ted
BTW, Ted is another one, like DQuinn, who offers years of experience, and has been around the world a few times, so to speak. He’s also the one who specializes in making those staples for P.Keenan I was telling you about.
Hey thanks Ted for the advice about the bellows. I will try and do that soon. I had no idea that beeswax and lard make sucha good combo. Can you use for the bag also? Thanks again
Joseph
Ted , I did that once ,and I put the bellows near the radiator so the whole thing would dry out some , it worked , + I added some mink oil to the mixture to make sure the leather was supple , and I would not have to redo the leather on the bellows for a bit . I left it on the radiator for a week , when I came back , the bellows was dry and air tight , and the leather was supple . nice stuff. tom .
You can use the beeswax/lard mixture for bag seasoning. It should be made with a higher ratio of lard in it than for bellows seasoning. Denis Brooks’ tutor has the correct proportions for each mixture.It is placed in the bag hot, sloshed around and the excess poured out before it cools.Be sure to get out as much as possible. Nothing like a greasy wax blob to blow through into the chanter head and foul your best reed. Could ruin your whole day. Some vegetarians use Crisco instead of lard in the mixture. Northumbrian pipers often favor using mixtures with oil in them, but they are too messy IMHO. They also like to oil their key pads and air valves too, and often have oily looking bellows. GHB seasoning is not suitable for UP bags. They usually contain glycerin which soaks up moisture and may require some moisture to function. Part of seasoning GHB bags is for moisture control which is not needed on the UP.