Hi all
wonder if anyone has experience of the effect changing chanter (complete with reed) from one bag to another can have on the tone of the chanter and reed?
Am lucky enough now to have two sets of pipes at home, having recently fitted a Banatyne bag and moisture system to Silver and plastic mounted drones whilst continuing with the hide bag and no moisture control on the old plastic mouted set.
Should I call imitation ivory plastic?
Pretentious?
Moi?
Seems sensible to blow the chanters through the moisture system thus cutting out all that destructive moisture, right??
The difference in tone tho’ has been remarkable. High G is really sharp and needs heaps of tape to bring it down compared with the hide bag, which somehow, mysteriously, requires that the tape be removed.
Also sounds like there’s a strange noise coming from the set with the new bag and canister of silica gel.
Could the gel be impeding the air to the chanter and somehow making a noise in the process?
Is it possible the Omega reeds and silver slides on the drones make a ringing noise?
I have heard that silver slides can ring.
One thing is clear. Changing chanters between these two bags has a significant effect on tone.
Anyone out there with any thoughts?
Cheers.James
Hi James !
YES the Bag material will make a big difference, as I found out in the Mid 1990s.
The Gore-tex Bag of those years “Wicked” away the moisture so fast that I seems to be reaching
for “Bio-Stasis” or Water “Equilibrium” with my Cane Reeds and NEVER getting it,
so I went back to my L&M Hide-Bag. I found that the Gore Tex Bag was also really Floppy,
so I was always trying to hold or Grip the Chanter as it moved around.
Those new Bags with Gore Tex with a Leather outside layer seems to have solved that problem.
Now I don’t know if the 2 Layers also affects water retention inside the Bag, or not.
(Any User Comments ?)
Now these mostly DRY Bags with all the Kitty-Litter Canisters in Zip-Up Bags
(with or without Tubes to the Drone Stocks)… it seems to me that you would
only want to run all Plastic Reeds in everything i.e. Composite Drone Reeds,
and a Clan-rye Plastic Chanter Reed.
Unfortunately… there’s not a lot of TONE generated by these Devices.
As someone who runs Wygent Drone Reeds in one of my GHB sets (for Weddings and Funerals)
I seem to be flicking and adjusting the Plastic Tongues on these Reeds ANYWAY !!!
(This Set is not the One I play on a regular Basis so it’s MY fault HuH ?)
If you really want to run the most completly Dry Bag…
Use a Bellows !!! Then…You will find that you will still be at the mercy of the relative
HUMIDITY of the Atmosphere !
Good Luck with Your Piping !
Sean Folsom
P.S. I forgot to mention the PRESSURE factor… i.e. the Altitude factor, as I found
out playing at 7,500 feet above Sea Level, at Longs Peak Games.
All the Top Hand Notes were Sharp up there, at approximately 7 1/2 P.S.I.
versus 14 1/2 P.S.I. down at the Ocean.
Could all this Gel and Tubes cut down on the internal Pressure inside the Bag ?
Think about it…S.F.
Probably it’s rather the moisture-control-system that influences Your cane-reed. If You don’t have SEVERE problems with slobbering while playing, throw it in the bin - no moisture-control needed with Gore/Bannatyne - rather the danger would be, that it’s TOO dry for cane-reeds (, as You probably just experience…). 
Now, to the reeds: It’s not about the quality of the sound anymore - most professional players use plastic- (carbon, metal, whatever…) reeds in their drones already since the 90ies - while in the 80ies everyone said, anything but cane - at least for the tongues - is trash.
Clanrye-reeds do work fine, but about 80% of them sound really bad - so You’ll have to have a nice dealer who allows You to try the reeds untill You found the one sounding good in Your chanter. Yet most GHB-players OFFICIALLY say, Clanryes generally sound terrible - allthough I know 5 1st grade players - 3 of them international Piobreachd-champions (2 Scots, 1 Canadian) - who play Clanryes exclusively - but four of them would never admit that in public… 
Also, they’re pretty expensive… 
McLaren-reeds from Australia are a lot better - allthough some say, they sound a wee bit faint in the overtones. But that’s basically a question of hardness - the harder ones sound clearer. Whichever grade You choose - listening blind, You’d never know it’s not cane… 
Composite ghb chanter reeds have not yet been perfected to the quality of cane. I am certain that any piper worth their salt will be able to tell a clanrye from a cane chanter reed.
The double layer goretex/suede bag, with bottle & tube trap, is a superior moisture control system. It is simpler than compartmentalized/dessicant systems with dedicated tubes: fewer parts mean fewer things that can go wrong. It is also rather heavy. Virtually every modification made to a ghb can have some potential effect on its timbre; which is one reason there is a healthy business in producing ghb doo-dads designed to ‘improve tone’.
Good old fashioned reed-sense goes quite a long way. One of my ghb’s is a tough old 12 y.o. L&M hide bag, two matched lacquer-less 30 year old Canadian grenadilla tenors with eezedrones & superglued cracks; an abw Scots bass, with multiple cracks, completely taped up with pvc and black electrical tape, (rocket reed in that) & poly stocks, airstream, and strathmore chanter with a straight cut reed that is so old it is actually peeling. There is roofing ‘flash-tape’ where the projecting mounts once were, and the ‘ferrules’, such as they are, consist of black waxed hemp under a layer of clear fingernail polish.
It has never let me down, sounds fantastic, especially under 0 deg C. Rock solid, in tune, & dry as a bone as well.
ZdF: Could you please provide detailed photographs of the described bagpipe 
but of course
http://pbckt.com/sS.NfRY
here one can see it is completely and truly as I have said: tape, string, peeling reed, 13 year old bag.
and now please,
the names of:
“…5 1st grade players - 3 of them international Piobreachd-champions (2 Scots, 1 Canadian) - who play Clanryes exclusively…”
I will be agog to learn.
Very post-apocalyptic!