Tuning A Single Note

[stella24]

Dave,

 

what would you recommend as the best steel reed material to replace Lachenal reeds, that are the same hardness and tone? i found that a lachenal new model i tuned was so sharp to modern A440 that to bring it down required too much belly or root filing, and as a result the two lower A reeds will sound flat when played hard now. shouldv'e soldered an extra metal layer to the tip of each reed before filing (with low temp plumbers solder). An accordian reeded tina I have has this on the bass reeds to reduce their length. thanks. wes.

[Bruce McCaskey]

While I don't want to get in the way of Dave's response, in terms of replacement I'd suggest another Lachenal reed of the same pitch. I recall a post sometime back stating that the Button Box had an inventory of "several hundred" Lachenal reeds, which I assume were salvaged from unrestorable instruments.

 

Edited for spelling deficiencies.

Edited September 19, 2006 by Bruce McCaskey

[d.elliott]

Dave,

 

what would you recommend as the best steel reed material to replace Lachenal reeds, that are the same hardness and tone? thanks. wes.

 

I believe that the reeds were made from the spring steel of the day. Not modern spring steels, but just a high carbon steel that had been well wrought, hardened and temperd. Look under the reeds they are usually blue, sometimes dark straw (quite hard).

 

I look at the thickest part of the reed surviving (usually under the clamp) select the closest ground feeler guage stock that I have. Temper it to the appropriate colour. Take dimensions from the broken reed, or a comparable stock or other instrument reed - recording length, tip and belly stock thickness. Using hand files I use the now tempered guage steel to make the new reed to fit the frame. A low brightness light box, as sold by Hobbycraft (£10 ish) in the UK is handy.

 

Guage steel is high-ish carbon and fairly hard, plus comparable in properties, the temper to blue leaves a close approximation to ductility to the original properties. Having got a fit to the frame I start on the thicknesses, by forming the belly thickness first the reed will not be too weak, and its better to bring a slightly stronger reed up to pitch. If its' sound is too harsh, you can always soften it back by taking it down half a semitone and then bringing it back to its pitch.

 

 

Dave,

 

.... shouldv'e soldered an extra metal layer to the tip of each reed before filing (with low temp plumbers solder). An accordian reeded tina I have has this on the bass reeds to reduce their length. thanks. wes.

 

Weighted reeds are often weak sounding, unless they are that way from new, and even plumber's solder will over anneal the reeds. Unless a heat sing is used to protect the working area (belly ) of the reed

 

Dave

[Richard Morse]

While I don't want to get in the way of Dave's response, in terms of replacement I'd suggest another Lachenal reed of the same pitch. I recall a post sometime back stating that the Button Box had an inventory of "several hundred" Lachenal reeds, which I assume were salvaged from unrestorable instruments.

Quite right. I would think getting a comparable used reed would be vastly easier, less expensive, and would probably be far closer in response and tone to the rest of your reeds than trying to make a reed from scratch.

 

-- Rich --

[m3838]

While I don't want to get in the way of Dave's response, in terms of replacement I'd suggest another Lachenal reed of the same pitch. I recall a post sometime back stating that the Button Box had an inventory of "several hundred" Lachenal reeds, which I assume were salvaged from unrestorable instruments.

Quite right. I would think getting a comparable used reed would be vastly easier, less expensive, and would probably be far closer in response and tone to the rest of your reeds than trying to make a reed from scratch.

 

-- Rich --

 

 

I tried, per Richard's suggestion, to get some extra brass reeds from Button Box, but with no luck. However, Concertina Spares did have the needed reeds and accepted Paypal.

[Richard Morse]

I would think getting a comparable used reed would be vastly easier, less expensive, and would probably be far closer in response and tone to the rest of your reeds than trying to make a reed from scratch.

I tried, per Richard's suggestion, to get some extra brass reeds from Button Box, but with no luck.

Ah, now I remember your situation coming through the Button Box channels. The way this tread was going I though you had steel reeds. We've got lots of steels reeds and very few sets of brass reeds.

 

-- Rich --

[DavidFR]

Weighted reeds are often weak sounding, unless they are that way from new, and even plumber's solder will over anneal the reeds. Unless a heat sing is used to protect the working area (belly ) of the reed

 

Dave

While the G/D Lachenal I recently acquired from Paul Groff really has fantastic reeds for an instrument of this type, some of the lowest notes were noticeably slow to respond. It wasn't entirely unexpected given that they are Lachenal reeds and that low G-reed is just huge, but I was quickly convinced that faster response for those low bass notes would be invaluable in my morris playing.

 

So Paul and I decided to try replacing some of those notes with some spare Wheatstone reeds he had lying around to see if the response would be better, and if the sound on those notes would be radically different. When I visited him in his shop a few weeks ago to try this out, I was fascinated that he needed to add a solder weight to get his Wheatstone reed down to that low G. The Lachenal reed it was replacing was also weighted similarly, and Paul told me that this was done originally on the largest reeds in low-pitched instruments to get them all to fit. When doing this Paul used a special kind of solder and put a thin sheet of stainless steel between the bottom of the reed (still clamped) and the top of the reed shoe to position the reed for easy access and to act as a heat sink.

 

The resulting reed was quick to respond, rich and beautiful in tone, so I think it's a reasonable thing to do; I just wouldn't recommend it unless you have LOTS of experience and some extra reeds to burn. Also, since after weighting you tune by filing down the solder, take care to avoid breathing in the resultant lead dust. It would be interesting to discover if modern makers still use this technique for G/D and baritone instruments.