Klarinet Archive - Posting 000421.txt from 1996/04

From: Mark Charette <charette@-----.COM>
Subj: Re: Help! Barrel is stuck!
Date: Mon, 15 Apr 1996 11:14:55 -0400

Nate Burk wrote:
>
> I had my clarinet put together for a few hours yesterday, and it rained so
> much that the added humidity caused the wood to swell up. Now I can't get
> the barrel off the first joint! Can anyone tell me what I can do? This thing
> is *really* stuck! Does it need to go to repair shop?
>

Nate, knowing next to nothing about clarinets but a bit about wood,

1) either wait for the humidy to go down OR
2) take it to a repair shop to get it apart.

You should probably go to the repair shop anyway if it happens again -
forcing it apart can cause "interesting" things to happen (like a barrel
flying across the room when it lets go) or the pressure from the tenon
causing a latent crack to appear in the barrel.

I've seen a bunch of damaged brass instruments caused by people trying
to wrench stuck mouthpieces out of leadpipes when a mouthpiece puller
would've got it unstuck in a moment - why take chances with a valuable
instrument ?

--
Mark Charette "Languages come; languages go--only Fortran is for
Mika Systems, Inc the ages." - Jim Glass
charette@-----.com