I’ve got to wondering what shortening the chanter does to the tuning of bottom D (I suspect it sharpens it).
The reeds I make tend to gurgle on bottom D and have flat back D’s. I scrape further to reduce gurgles, but this flattens the back D so I trim the reed. I repeat this process a few times until I’m left with a nub of a reed and have to start again.
I’ve experimented with rolls of card in the bell of a chanter as another way of combatting the gurgle issue, but I wonder about maybe making an extension for the chanter for experimental purposes to see if this helps such a reed.
Take all the crap out of the bell and you probably won’t have a gurgle. You also won’t be flat. You need a bigger hole in the bell. That also sharpens bottom D. That roll of crap makes it smaller. Make it bigger. It will not only be sharper but not gurgle. Try it.
Adding and extention is the exact opposite of what you want, what makes you think it would help? And why haven’t you just taken all the crap out of the bell in the first place if you’re flat and gurgling?
I just think it’s amusing that someone would think of cutting a reed all to a stub, shaving and cutting etc, or adding a bell extention, but never think of taking the crap out of the bell–since the bell is obviously your problem. That’s a whole lot of avoiding the obvious fact that there’s a wad of crud blocking up your bottom D, and bottom D is your problem.
I may have not made myself clear, but making the hole smaller by putting any sort of crud of any shape in the bell of your chanter will both flatten it, and can make it prone to gurgle.
The fact that somebody else has a longer chanter may have nothing to do with your problem, well it probably won’t because you aren’t playing their chanter. Do not envy a longer chanter. It’s not always better. You are playing yours. Longer means flatter anyway. If it’s longer and sharper, it’s because the hole is biggier. That’s what we might call an “interactive” geometric/acoustic arrangement. Or maybe they just don’t have a lot of garbage shoved and rolled up in the bell.
Try that first. Take the rubbish out of your bell.
If you just want to experiment, you can lengthen the chanter with a piece of thin tubing that fits snug into the end of the bore just far enough to keep it in place. Make it about a ½" long. This would lower the pitch both by narrowing the end of the bore and by lengthening it. Even a tube you normally find on the outside of the end of the chanter can be moved up or down to change length, and thus the pitch.
Usually, it’s the throat being too wide that causes some reeds to gurgle. Wire placed in the throat, at various lengths, can cure some reeds from gurgling. I cured one gurgling reed with a brass sleeve stuck down inside the throat. Another reed didn’t gurgle at all, even w/o the sleeve. Both reeds were made by pros. The match stick in the throat seems way too thick for that purose. Other reeds take a rush in the bell to cure the gurgle. Often it’s the reed itself, the design. As another experiment, try sticking a thin wire all the way up inside the length of the bore.
If I remember right, the end of the scrape up in the V is where the E note lives, the D being at the other end—the lips (both octaves). But what you do by scraping here and there can affect lots of things in the reeds performance.
One of the easiest solutions to a gurgle is to dangle some thread off the end of the reed staple into the throat of the chanter. It’ll narrow the throat and create a little more random turbulance in the throat. The matchstick is usualy way too much as Lorenzo said.
Living in a semi-arid high-elevation climate - Colorado USA, I discovered some surprising effects. A reed that doesn’t gurgle in a more humid climate will often gugle in Colorado. If I rub a little cobbler’s wax on the surface of the reed, and work it in, it will often take the gurgle out and restore a lost hard-bottom D. If you have dry air in your area, that might be something to try. Just please don’t try it on your favorite reed.
Thanks all - I’ve tried all suggestions except Dirk’s rubbing cobbler’s wax one. I do live in a very dry climate, so this may help
Thanks especially to Lorenzo for specifically answering the question that was posted.
Royce,
I never at any point said that the bottom D was flat - I said that I have had flat “back D’s” when scraping the reed at the base. Now…it may be a case of me being over analytical of peoples words due to the psychology degree I did at Uni, but from your reply, it sounds like you may have a homophobia or a subconcious awarness that you are suffering from constipation - (a phobia about crap being jammed up an ‘out hole’ / a very strong desire for crap to be removed from the ‘out hole’). Sorry if this is a misconception, but you may want to do a bit of soul searching on this topic . However, in response to the suggestion, I have experimented with both adding and removing various forms of crap and have found that a no crap scenario results in an extremely sharp bottom D and an even worse gurgle so I’ll retain my crap for now and will try lorenzo’s advice as an experiment.
djm,
I’m all for experimentaion for improving reeds, but please tell me that you are not giving the listerine advice based on a ‘tried and tested’ experience!
I suggest you call Ian Mackenzie for advice. The shortened bell with tuning cork does work well, it’s designed and voiced that way. Removal of the cork and adding an extension may affect tuning of the other notes.
If you have access to a lathe you can cut an extension (probably 3-4mm long) that will press fit into the bell without changing the chanter in any way. This way, if you don’t like modification you can remove the extension and re-insert the cork ring. Been there, done that.
Thanks for letting me know you’ve removed the impaction from your bell and that definitely isn’t the problem.
I don’t remember asking you to check for crap in your A hole, but knock yourself out, sounds like there may be some.
Royce
(Oh, by the way, your reed is just too damned weak or way overscraped probably. You’re totally screwed. Send me the reed and the chanter and I’ll let you know what’s wrong with it.)
Oh well,
Just as Tony said “been there, done that”, it didn’t help matters. The extension with the roll of card removed kept the tuning of bottom D the same, but just quietened the note without lessening the gurgle. I’ll just have to stick with stiffer, more opened/louder reeds to avoid gurgles.
I’ve always used very thin-walled brass staples, which require a deeper insersion into the reed head for tuning back D and the second octave so perhaps the shortness of my reeds is part of the problem. I’m expecting a delivery from Howard Music of Catalonian cane (probably softer than mine) and some staples (they look a bit thicker then mine) in a few days so I’ll see how things go with some new materials.
Tony,
Ian has made lots of replacement reeds for me back in the early days when I would fiddle with them in an attempt to make them quieter. His reeds are good, but as he works with stiff ‘reeds australia’ cane, they are rather loud and so that’s why I took to making my own reeds. I’ve not tried supplying him with softer cane since recently aquiring some for him to make a reed with, but I may ask him to do this if I fail to fine-tune my reed making skills in the near future. I can make a loud non-gurgling reed that is in tune with some of my stiff cane, but am reasonably new to working with softer cane so I’ve got to make a few more to find a design/scrape shape that works well.
If everything goes well, Ian will have some softer cane to work with in less than two months time so you may want to check back with him later. Again, let him make the adjustments for what works best for his chanters. I know from experience my Mackenzie chanters want to be loud and any attempt to make them quiet affected the performance. It’s a tradeoff… all out performance versus tuning problems, sinking back D or gurgling. You have to decide where you want to be.
I recall some time ago getting a load of rubbish from people because I keep saying adjusting a reed simply for the sake of making it quieter is not a pertinent goal to piping. A reed is as loud as it is. A chanter is as loud as it is. However it works out when it’s working and playing fine is how loud is ought to be.
Yeah, the minute you got to the root of the problem I can pretty much assure you what you did first is close the reed down with the bridle till it started gurgling on bottom D. Then you like the quietness, but tried to cheat around the gurgle by scraping some more. Odds are the reedmaker/chanter maker had it already scraped pretty close to where it should have been and you went well beyond this simply trying to correct a gurgling bottome D you created in the first place by closing it too much.
You may be able to find a quiter reed via cane type etc, but why? If you have a maker and a chanter and reed that work, why?
. However, in response to the suggestion, I have experimented with both adding and removing various forms of crap and have found that a no crap scenario results in an extremely sharp bottom D and an even worse gurgle so I’ll retain my crap for now and will try lorenzo’s advice as an experiment.
