Here are 3 great videos on making hand sewn bellows from start to finish that were posted on YouTube recenyly.
proff bellowsmaker…
That’s a well equipped work shop.
This is just outstanding; shows craftsmanship of the highest quality.
Does anyone know if the maker (I don’t know his name) has posted video related to his method of making the hinge?
Having all this equipment is nice, but really the essentials, for me anyway, are sharp cutting knives, a cutting surface, a bandsaw with wood and metal blades, a spindle sander, a grinder, a lathe of some sort, and a torch and silver solder. His well equipped shop sure makes many tasks easier.
One thing that was impressive was his ability to route the stitching groove apparently freehand… or did I miss something… was he using a template of some sort?
The guy’s name is MarKus Gabel. That groove is routed free-hand. You could always ask him on YouTube, to post another video on how he does his hinges. He has a total of 28 videos about bagpipes of one kind or another and how to work on them. My German is a little rusty but I can catch the gist.
Gaa… every time I have tried to route that groove freehand it has been a disaster, and I don’t feel very safe with that 15K RPM bit spinning free. Now I use a template or a rig that hugs the edge of the clapper, like for cutting the perfling groove on a violin. Davey S. once had a good tutorial online for using a template for cutting this groove, but it is gone now. Maybe it’s cached somewhere.
Impressive.
There’s a groove in the back of the template that’s attached to the clapper, and a fixed pin aligned with the router bit on the table below the template. He’s moving the template/clapper assembly over the pin on the table.
You can see the groove in the template when he’s sawing out the clapper on the table saw, and when he’s profiling the edge of the clapper.
How pricey migth his made bellows are?
Mercedes Benzellows
Markus has posted a 4th video detailing how he does the hinge, installs the inlet valve and makes and installs the straps. He does say how he uses a pin that the template rides on to route the groove and advises againts doing it free hand.
Here is number 4: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IwQfzENxxdA&NR=1