Brass Reeds Vs Steel

[stevejay]

Hi

 

Hope you could help me out on this..

 

Do brass reeds go out of tune at a MUCH greater rate than steel, and how would you describe the tone in relation to steel. I know it is softer, but to a very significant extent? The loss of pitch concerns me more.

 

Thanks,

 

Steve

[Paul_Hardy]

Do brass reeds go out of tune at a MUCH greater rate than steel, and how would you describe the tone in relation to steel. I know it is softer, but to a very significant extent? The loss of pitch concerns me more.

 

Well the tina that I play more than my others is a brass-reeded Wheatstone (Wheatstone 8461) that just passed its 150th birthday, and almost all the reeds are original and still in tune!

 

The tone is substantially softer, quieter and sweeter than the steel-reeded Lachenal which is what I use for sessions etc. The softer tone of the brass-reeded instrument is what makes it a better bet for practicing around the house. However I've tried it in group music situations and it just doesn't carry well enough.

 

--

Paul Hardy

paul at paulhardy.net

(An Englishman currently exiled in southern California!)

[Larry Stout]

--- how would you describe the tone in relation to steel. I know it is softer, but to a very significant extent?

 

If you want a comparison, here are links to the same tune recorded under the same conditions (in my study) by the same player (me) on two very different instruments. The tune is "Behind the Bush in the Garden" which I learned at the Champaign, Illinois, Irish session about 25 years ago. Wheatstone2667 is a brass reeded, rosewood ended tutor from 1851 with its spruce baffles intact. Wheatstone25813 is a metal ended, steel reeded instrument from 1913 with no baffles. They sound quite different.

 

I haven't had either instrument long enough to know how quickly they go out of tune. It probably depends a lot on how you play.

[stevejay]

Thank you for these informative answers. Those are very nice concertinas as well. I hope to have a vintage one someday, and am will consider the brass reeds now. The tune sounded very nice, I learned it on mine, it was catchy!

 

Steve

[JimLucas]

Do brass reeds go out of tune at a MUCH greater rate than steel, and how would you describe the tone in relation to steel. I know it is softer, but to a very significant extent? The loss of pitch concerns me more.

My own (admittedly limited) experience is that neither brass nor steel reeds in English-built concertinas have a particular tendency to "go out of tune" unless they suffer harm, e.g., either corrosion or work hardening. Brasses seem to be more prone than steels to work hardening, which leads to cracking of the reed. But IME that sort of "going out of tune", once started, will quickly lead to the complete loss of the reed and the need for replacement, not just adjusting the tuning every few years.

 

It's been mentioned more than once that different steels were used by different makers and during different periods by the same maker. Maybe also in different models by the same maker at the same time? I don't recall any similar discussion with regard to brass, though it makes sense to me that there should be similar differences. I think all the brass-reeded concertinas in which I've seen the broken-or-breaking reeds were both well over 100 years old and cheaper models, though not necessarily showing heavy use, while some apparently well used ones had all reeds intact and in tune. This leads me to wonder whether different qualities of brass were used either in different models or different periods (or both), and that some reed brasses are more prone to work hardening and cracking than others. Maybe it's a parameter that should receive more attention?

[mper]

Jim has referred to work-hardening as a potential life-shortening problem for "brass" reeds. I should prefer

always to use the term "non-ferrous" for those reeds which are not some form of steel.

 

whether they are 70/30, 60/40 brasses, aluminium bronze , phosphor-bronze or "nickel silvers"they will all rely, not only upon their single or two-phase microstructure but actually upon initial work-hardening , by rolling or hammering for their desirable spring-like properties.

 

In use, they remain well within their elastic range and are not subject to work-hardening. As with steel

reeds, their main enemy will always be fatigue failure, often starting from internal inclusions or second phases

but also from residual file marks and tuning damage.

 

I have always been interested in non ferrous materials which derive their properties from precipitation or

dispersion hardening, produced by heat, rather than mechanical, treatment. Copper-Beryllium is a typical

example, which I have, once or twice, used in my very old non-ferrous reeded Wheatstone tutor model.

 

Carbide precipitation is, of course involved in the tempering of steel reeds, so the principle is well

established. I always wanted to try an ultra-high-strength maraging steel for reeds but never got round

to it !

 

 

mper

[Chris Allert]

another thing i'd like to know about brass reeds:

 

does anyone make brass accordion reeds? i wonder how these would sound in a concertina?

[Dana Johnson]

In use, they remain well within their elastic range and are not subject to work-hardening.

mper

 

Clearly someone very familar with metalurgy.

 

I am always surprised by just how far reeds will swing at high volumes. ( check with a strobe) Lifting the reeds that much is often more than enough to change the set of the reed, which I would think implies going past the elastic limit, albeit not very far. In operation, reeds swing both directions though and I surmise any change tends to get evened out. But I do find reeds "adjusting" themselves slightly afer some good loud playing. Some of this I chalk up to stress relief from the unbalanced removal of metal to develop the profile.

 

Harder tempered (higher tensile strength ) reeds of a given spring steel are better at handling the larger amplitudes without deformation. I don't know how the non ferrous alloys behave here, but wouldn't assume with their substantially lower tensile strengths that they never swing past their elastic limit. The question I have is what happens to the elastic limit as a piece of metal "work hardens". Perhaps it ends up higher after a while until it is no longer exceeded? Most of our examples are of dramatic bending far exceeding the elastic limit, not something that is only slight. Part of developing a good reed profile is making sure the bending is spread relatively evenly to avoid parts of the reed bending too much.

 

In any case, well made reeds have an astoundingly long life and I thnk most of the trouble comes from poor filing or corrosion at some level. Reed steel can be very hard, and it doesn't take much to develop microscopic cracks along the edges when they are first made.

Dana