Practice set on eBay

http://cgi.ebay.com/Ray-Sloan-Uilleann-pipes-practice-set-Made-in-Ireland_W0QQitemZ7375684260QQcategoryZ16226QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

Top of the page says they’re made in Ireland… if that is the Owner’s choice of words, I doubt this auction is legitimate. Hmmmmmmmm. :confused:

Being a little familiar with Ray’s products I question both the bellows and the padding as being a little “questionable”.
Anasazi Piper

For comparison, a Sloan chanter sold on uilleannobsession.com earlier this year:

I have a Sloan practice set. My bellows looks a bit differently. It doesn’t have large headed tacks, the outlet is nickel silver, not brass, matching the chanter & chanter stock. It also has nickel silver strips fastening the arm & waist straps, all the screws are “timed” (screw slots aligned in one direction), and both belts are stamped SLOAN. This may just be a minor production difference. My chanter has keyblocks & looks identical to the one in PJ’s pics. It should be easy enough to bring this auction to Rays attention to verify that everything is indeed his.

Are those plastic reeds (the ones with the red binding)!!! … in a Ray Sloan chanter? To quote Billy Shakespeare, “Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.”

Bellows looks to be very similar to Dixon’s make.

Here’s an image of a practice set from RS’s website:

The chanter which is for sale looks like the read deal - although it doesn’t seems to have blocks. I can’t see enough of the bellows to decide.

The red reeds do indeed look plastic.

Bellows looks Pakistani made. The chanter is a Sloan creation.

Could just be an earlier set. However the 2 reeds with red binding are plastic and not Ray’s, the other 2 I’m not so sure about. Ray normally does use red binding but he also uses and prefers copper wire for a bridle with just 2 turns of wire which these appear to have, if my eyes are correct.So like I say, maybe it’s an old set with an old style of bellows. :party:

I used to own a set of Sloan Scottish smallpipes and the bellows looked exactly like the eBay set. (I took photos prior to selling them, so I was able to verify).

The plastic reeds look like highland practice chanter reeds to me.

Best, John

They are also the same reeds that come with some Pakistani sets… like the one I have.