Klarinet Archive - Posting 000833.txt from 1997/09

From: DYungkurth@-----.com
Subj: Re: warped! and Zonda Life
Date: Wed, 17 Sep 1997 12:14:02 -0400

Bill Fogle wrote:

>I never thought about wet sanding. I can picture wet sanding a table
>(usually with alcohol, etc.). How would you determine if the 8wet8 reed is
>flat (you can't slide it across paper). It's good to know that my question
>is shared by others. I've sanded for as long as I've been playing (always
>dry sanding) and lately I've stopped. I just think all that sanding gets
>lost as soon as the reed gets wet.

I seem to be one of the few using wet sanding. This method just happens to
work for me. Whether you condition and adjust reeds or use them right out of
the box seems to be a fundamental or philosophical difference among people
discussing this on Klarinet over the years.

For many years (30+?) I was an "out of the box" type, since I didn't have a
clue that there was any choice. Since changing to conditioning and adjusting
methods, I probably tend to get rid of reeds because they have physical
damage, chips or cracks. They just don't seem to "wear out".

Sanding wet isn't the big deal it sounds like. You take a well-soaked reed
and remove the surface water with lips, fingers, tissues - whatever. Wet
three fingers (index, middle and ring) so that they tend to stick to the
reed. On the first few strokes the reed will bind on the sandpaper and these
must be done carefully. Then move to a dry area on the sandpaper and the
sanding will proceed without a problem.

As to how much to sand - as little as possible to get the reed flat. How do
you tell if the reed is flat? Polish the reed on the *back* side of "wet or
dry" (waterproof) sandpaper. Again, polishing a wet reed isn't a problem
once the surface water is gone. Look at the polished reed at a low angle
toward a light. You will see shiny areas and dull areas when the viewing
angle and light position are correct. The shiny areas are the high spots
that need more sanding. The reed is flat and sanded enough when the entire
polished area is uniformly shiny (except perhaps the tip of the reed - you
probably shouldn't be sanding or polishing the tip very much).

A number of people have mentioned about Zonda reeds starting out great but
having a short useful life. I haven't had this problem, but offer some
possible explanations.

I conditioned my trial Zondas the same way I condition my usual V12s, even
though I found them to be mostly playable as received. That is, four wet/dry
cycles over a four day period with wet sanding on the third and fourth days.
I noticed that the Zondas were very porous - you could practically use them
for straws out of the box! When wetting them in your mouth you could
actually draw air through them.

Part of the conditioning process is to seal the pores by lightly sanding the
vamp of the reed and then polishing the vamp with the back of wet or dry
sandpaper. After this, the reeds are no longer porous, probably greatly
extending their useful life. By the way, the Zondas played even better after
the conditioning and sanding!

Don Yungkurth (DYungkurth@-----.com)