Klarinet Archive - Posting 000868.txt from 2000/08

From: "Dee D. Hays" <deehays@-----.net>
Subj: Re: [kl] Plastic vs. Wood
Date: Sun, 27 Aug 2000 14:03:15 -0400

----- Original Message -----
From: "les debusk" <sflane@-----.com>
Subject: [kl] Plastic vs. Wood

>
> What is the difference? Is it not the material but the design and
> components that make the sound correct? Or is there another side to the
> story? If you made a clarinet identical (size,bore,ring size,key
> position,ect..) to a, lets say, Buffet R-13 out of a heavy plastic would
> you not get the same tone and sound? In many ways i dont think so. But
> thinking about it, wood warps and cracks. Plastic doesn't. And many
> clarinet players often play with a barrel made of a sort of plastic
> because most of the time the wooden barrel has to be replaced every few
> years due to the change of the roundness and because it warps. Another
> question to this story is..... Does wood resonate more than a heavy
> plastic? And does the thickness and weight play into the sound
> production? In other words i know there has to an acoustic reason for
> wood. If there wasn't they could be made out of anything sturdy enough,
> true?
> Thank you,
> Les DeBusk

For starters, clarinets pre-date the development of plastics. So choices
were limited. The "great debate" was over which wood to use. Wood had a
long established tradition before plastics ever hit the scene.

However, the biggest obstacle is what is known as "consumer resistance".
The buying public general selects products very illogically on an emotional
basis. It is not unknown for good products to disappear due to such
resistance. The manufacturers are well aware of this problem. Because
plastics were and are used so extensively for student instruments (some of
which are poorly made), it will be very difficult for them to overcome this
consumer resistance. They might consider the risk unacceptable from a
financial standpoint.

Those of us with technical or research backgrounds often find it difficult
to understand how companies can fail to investigate some of these things and
we also fail to understand how easy it is for consumers to let their
preconceived notions over rule scientifically generated data.

Dee Hays

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