I’ve just spent the morning at Malcolm McLaren’s house talking about pipes and all that, as you do.
He demonstrated his plastic GHB chanter reeds and they sounded superb. But I digress.
I told him I was having problems with my drones and that they were letting out too much air. So he pulled out the cane reeds, took out a container and picked out three brass reeds with plastic tongues, fiddled with the string a bit, put them in my drones and hey presto!!
They’ve never felt so easy to play. I could get my pet blow fly to come and sit on the bag and that would be all that was needed to drive them. And they are sturdy as.
Granted they sound a bit reedy, but my Eugene Lambe drones have always been a bit that way. I’m happy.
Here’s an mp3 I recorded earlier with the new reeds. A bit large - 1.4mb.
One of our local pipers is making his own syth. drone reeds. I’m working on a brief write up for the site, but in the mean time, hopefully a few images may help.
The black bands are called o-rings and can be found at hardware and automotive supply stores. They come in many sizes. Pick something that will be fairly tight for the diameter of tubing you wish to use.
in the meantime, do you think you could throw a brief list of important measurements up there? tongue thickness, a description of what the brass under the tongue should be like, brass diameters etc?
Hei to the West! Marc van Daal uses composite drone reeds (cane as body and a brass (?) tongue). At least for the bass drone of my half-set. His website is here.
But aren’t you smart brave enough to try yourself?
Tickety boo, Thies
P.S.: Chamberpilliä soitaa hyvin. Odotan nyt ostajalle …
Those look familiar! I think Brian has some more pics with different angles. You can see that they are quite long. I made them about the same length and diametre as the non-working cane reeds that came with my 1/2 set. I am sure that you could cut 3-4 cm off of the drone end of the reed. It was just convenient to have some length to hold onto when I was sanding off the top of the tubing I just didn’t cut it off after. There is about an octave worth of adjustment with that length of tongue and some blue-tack. I think the hardest part of getting them stable was getting the beds flat and even. These are nice stable reeds in my Roberts drones. The worst you can do is screw up 20cents worth of material.
How did you make sure the filed top of the tube is flat? Is it filed at an angle or flat straight across? If filed striaght across, how do you glue the base of the tongue onto the resulting shelf?
What is the thickness of the plastic you use? It looks thicker than the stuff I use, which is .02" (0.5mm). It’s made by Evergreen Scale Models and available in hobby stores.
Do you solder the ends or use a bee’s wax plug. Ray Sloan drone reed bodies are hand forged, I think, without any seams or soldering at the end. The other end of the body, the end that fits into the drone, does have a soldered seam. That end is also slightly tapered. When I figure out how to put photos up here I’ll post one.
well, i tried to replicate what i saw, and got two going to some degree, it’s a good method it seems, but before i spend any more time in the workshop i will wait for actual plans with full measurements etc…i’m dying to make a reliable set of synthetic drone reeds. that would leave the only cane reed in my set in my chanter. yes, yes…i know i’m a heretic, but the weather in NJ is just so nutty that it’s either get something impervious to the weather or carry five sets of reeds with you…
Model Engineering suppliers are a good source for ‘o’ rings - ‘yellow pages’ or visit your local newsagents and look through copies of “Model Engineer” or “Engineering in Miniature” magazines for a stockist near to you - Reeves, Birmingham will have them in a variety of sizes
I just look at them and also hold a tongue to them while holding them up to light. I don’t glue the tongues, I just wrap with teflon. The tongue comes to a point and I just put that in the hole. Those reeds use 0.8mm styrene available in strips from the hobby shop. I use beeswax. To make the outlet smaller, I epoxy smaller pieces of tubing into the end.
Antaine-
Just go for it. I think there are millions of permutations for drone reeds. Go see what you have available for materials and use them.
Joseph have you been studying that stuff that Antaine sent out???
I think Brian has some more pics with different angles. You can see that they are quite long. I made them about the same length and diametre as the non-working cane reeds that came with my 1/2 set. I am sure that you could cut 3-4 cm off of the drone end of the reed. It was just convenient to have some length to hold onto when I was sanding off the top of the tubing I just didn’t cut it off after. There is about an octave worth of adjustment with that length of tongue and some blue-tack. I think the hardest part of getting them stable was getting the beds flat and even. These are nice stable reeds in my Roberts drones. The worst you can do is screw up 20cents worth of material.