I have recently experienced a reed setup that incorporates a short piece of metal tubing placed into the reed socket (just as a reed does) and the reed slides within this metal tubing.
For years I have heard this is the way Tim Britton does it but I haven’t tried it out myself.
The procedure is to use hobby tubing sleeve that is the next diameter larger to the one your reed is made from. You can then slide the staple in or out from the sleeve to tune it without having to re-hemp the reed as in the traditional method. In theory, this modification doesn’t affect the chanter and can be pulled out if the piper wishes to return to the traditional setup.
WHO IS USING THIS SYSTEM ??
Basically I’m looking for pros and cons.
Right now, I don’t like the slack within the concentric tubing tollerances (say that three times really fast) as it allows too much play and the reed actually vibrates and moves around a bit. I tried stick tack and tape (not at the same time) and I need something different to be happy with this experiment. Any ideas?
Tony, I was warned off of this system for exactly the reasons you mention, i.e. movement of the staple in the sleeve, not an air-tight seal. I suppose you could try beeswax if the fit is tight enough, but if it is too loose, you would have to use hemp to seal it, and if you have to go that far, then why bother with the sleeve?
I would be interested in any other methods you might know of to make the reed easier to adjust in the throat.
Tony, I use to do that on all my reeds, having learned it from Britton
in the mid-late '80s. I even did it on the reg reeds. What I use to do
is take a short piece of brass tubing, the next size up, 1/2" long, wound
with hemp glued to the tube) smooth edges with fine sand paper or rat-
tail file (inside and out), and press it into the throat. Find an old pair of
long tapered, elongated needle nose pliers and flare the end of the staple
until there’s a firm friction fit. Put marks on the sides of the staple with
a triangular file so you know where the tuning is best, or how far to
push it in. I wouldn’t recommend using thread or wax to take up the
slack. (the insert should only stick out slightly beyond the chanter)
I don’t use the slides anymore though, using reeds from BK, AB, and
tok. They don’t need adjusting. If the weather causes the reed to go
sharp, I just wind a little tiny piece of hemp on the base of the staple
…only takes a few seconds. I also use a tiny bit of the hardest xc ski
wax on the hemp to keep everything tight and in place. Dry climates
can cause the reed to come loose, otherwise.
i put one like lorenzo described in my childress d, but i almost never had to move it in or out so i went back to the hemp the needle nose pliers works well to expand-flare the staple end to fit snug in the tube.
tansy
I have the aforementioned “slider” tubing on my chanter and regs., I’m not sure how valuable they are for regs., as you have to then adjust your rushes etc.,but they are extremely good for the chanter. The idea of the tubing to be the next size up is not right. It needs to be wider, enough to accommodate some waxed hemp on the staple too. This way, it is totally airtight but adjustable. It’s just the job if you have to play with fixed tuned instruments that aren’t in concert (I’m talking cents here), and the amount of tina players I’ve worked with seem to often be flat…
If you find hemp to be to thick to accomodate the tubing sleeve, try some teflon tape. That way you can have a more airtight seal that can slide and fit tightly without having to adjust the staple diameter.
Marc
Lorenzo, would you please give us some more info on the use of ski wax… I’ve generally used my own tin of black wax, but hate dealing with the stuff… Ski wax sounds much more convenient…
my britton rebuilt chanter uses this setup. one downside is that there is no flare to it and so there is play in the reed. Another downside is that not everyone uses the same diameter staple, so the reed as you’re accustomed to making it may need to be totally remeasured to play with a smaller staple. Honestly, I’ve found it annoying and am very glad bruce childress doesn’t use that style. I find bruce’s more traditional chanter much easier to tune because the reed stays put.
Alan, on the sliders I’ve used, we leave the winding and tape off of the lower 3/4" to 1" of the bottom of the staple. If I were to use your reed as a slider, I certainly couldn’t use “the next size up.” I’d have to find something bigger yet to accomodate the thread you have wound down to the base of the staple, or unwind the thread a little.
The hobby shops in this country carry brass tubing for remote-control model airplane gas lines. “The next size up” refers to their 3 basic sizes where the outside diameter of one fits perfectly to the inside diameter of the next size up, but not so perfectly that it will not move easily. So, flaring the inside of one to a tight friction-fit means that it takes more than just a little effort to slide it up or down, and guarantees no leaks. If I remember right, those 3 sizes are referred to in .000" in Quinn’s “The Piper’s Despair” book, and as being used for the tenor, baritone, and bass regs, the baritone being the same as the chanter.
That’s the way Tim Britton did it anyway.
I know the thread and tape against the wall of the sleeve is good, and works, but the friction fit (metal to metal) keeps the reed straight up and down, and is even tighter, and of course harder to adjust. You have to twist and shout…I mean push or pull.
BTW, plumbers do the same thing with copper fittings (no thread, tape, or putty) and high water pressure doesn’t cause a perfect metal-metal joint to leak.
Either way, if there’s any leak at all, the reed will notify you with slight sinking of the back D.
I got the idea from all the tubes of ski wax I use to put on my cross-country skis. I use to belong to a racing team where eveything had to be perfect…snow to ski…for the perfect kick. If the kick is perfect, you don’t really even need the poles to keep up.
So, back in the late '80s-'90s anyway (I don’t know what the new stuff is like) we had different hardnesses of wax…coded by color. Green was the hardest…good for temperatures of about 0 degrees Fahrenheit up to 18 F. Blue was good for 18-24 F. Violet 24-28 F. and so on. Pariffin, or clear wax is harder than green, but has no adhesiveness, or tackiness to it. The green wax doesn’t melt and get messy unless it’s too hot to breath outside, yet it has a consistency like with a little tiny bit of honey added (don’t know the true ingredients).
Above 18 F this green wax would start to build up snow on the base of the ski so that you’d lose your glide completely, then you’d go to blue to correct it.
I found the green to be good (not perfect) for some of the things I needed in piping. One was to keep the hemp at the base of the staple from coming loose and falling out of the chanter in this dry climate. Also, it saves tying the thread…just rotate it around in the fingers a little and it’s good for life. I wouldn’t use it to wax/seal thread that is wound around the blades, nor would I use it for thread in the wood stock material (Bellows, bag, chanter, reed cap), nor would I use it for filling tone holes.
I was reading back through your original post, Tony, and you mentioned the sleeve sitting in the reed seat..which is correct, not in the “throat” as I had said.
The other thing about the green wax–I talked about it getting messy if it gets hot–well, I think that would be over 110 deg F. I’ve never had a problem with it in the pipes. I left the tube (not the pipes!:boggle: ) in the car on a hot day once and it melted and ran. Must have been about 130 F in the car.
I like that idea about a “threaded staple” esp. if the threads are quick drive, except I’m superstitious…I like the blades always facing the same direction with the back side of the bridle facing me . Another thing I forgot to mention–why I don’t use the sliders anymore–is because most of my staples are tapered, or rolled copper…which works best in some bores. I wish Ted would talk a little about that sometime (hey Ted!) since I heard that Paddy K uses his stapes. I think he could also shed some light on their use for older Quinn chanters.
My tube of green wax is really old, like 15+ years. It’s about 2 " high and 1 1/4 " wide. Brand name is “bratlie ski wax” and it is contained in aluminum that peels off/down as you need it. I’m sure that any ski shop would have it, or the equivilant at least.
Swix, or any brand is fine. The tube looks like this:
Just make sure it’s the coldest temp range (below 18 F), whatever the brand or color.
the needle nose pliers works well to expand-flare the staple end to fit snug in the tube.
. Another thing I forgot to mention–why I don’t use the sliders anymore–is because most of my staples are tapered, or rolled copper…which works best in some bores. I wish Ted would talk a little about that sometime (hey Ted!) since I heard that Paddy K uses his stapes. I think he could also shed some light on their use for older Quinn chanters.