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Re: Key Disassembling 20/7 vs 16/6

Author: Chris P
Date: 2014-10-01 00:38

I'd suggest you use the much harder wearing rubberised cork (gasket cork or rubco) on the articulated C#/G# lever (the heavy sprung part with the touchpieces) and coat it with graphite to make it slippery. Use the thinnest you can get - around 0.2mm to 0.3mm thick will be ideal. Some clarinets have no silencing material there but that will only create noise.

Also use thin rubco under the adjusting screws on the C#/G# pad cup and the forked Eb/Bb mechanism (on the E/B vent/LH3 ring key pad cup arm) or fit nylon tips to the screws, but they will create some noise even though they will last a long time and keep in regulation well. Natural cork is pretty useless in these applications as it wears out far too quickly, so a much harder wearing material is needed. Leather could be used but it soon hardens.

I've stuck with using nylon tipped adjusting screws on my full Boehms for log term reliability even though they do make some mechanical noise, but at least keeping things in regulation is better than having to replace silencing materials once they wear out. I fit a nylon tip to adjusting screw on the throat G# key on clarinets in preference of having anything glued into the slot on the throat A key as that often wears out. Make the nylon tip domed instead of square so it runs smoothly.

Former oboe finisher
Howarth of London
1998 - 2010
The opinions I express are my own.

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