 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: joseph o'kelly
Date: 2001-04-18 18:56
This question goes out to any repair people out there.
I love to restore and repair old instruments. One of the worst problems is when a spring breaks off the post and there is nothing to work with. How do you go about removing these springs?
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Author: jbutler
Date: 2001-04-19 00:40
Joseph,
Do you have a pair of spring removing pliers such as the ones from Ferree's? If not you can take a piece of hardened steel rod and taper it down to a fine point on your lathe, bench motor or drill press. I would harden the tip again just in case you got it a little too hot tapering it down. Once you've got a nice point (but not too sharp) you can remove the post from the clarinet body, set it down on a lead block and push it out with the rod and rawhide mallet. The old spring will stick (inbed) to the lead block when it gets pushed out far enough. Another way is to get the smallest automatic center punch made. General makes one that is miniscule, but they are hard to find. Ed Kraus has started selling it, but you can't order from him unless you can document that you have a repair business. You can push a broken spring out easily with this tool also. On these real old instruments it is often wise to put a little oil and heat to the post before trying to remove the spring. Those older springs have rust on them inside the post and that's why they break instead of pushing on out.
John
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Author: Gordon (NZ)
Date: 2001-04-19 13:44
Well said, John.
i'm a bit reticient about using an automatic punch because it seems more likely to jump off the spring and dimple the softer metal beside the spring. But at least it makes it ajob easily done with two hands.
I've also made punches from 3 or 4 mm steel rod drilled at the end to accept (soldered, glued or jammed) a short length of sping, so that it projects only 2 or 3 mm and is really well supported.
It is difficult to think of a good alternative to that lead block.
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