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Re: Using Shims instead of shrinking pliers

Author: jdbassplayer
Date: 2017-10-04 20:54

I believe the word you are looking for is swedging. Swedging is used more for reducing the diameter of hinge tubes so they fit more snugly on the rods. No bending or pulling is necessary, the plyers are simply placed over the tube to compress it down to a smaller diameter. A side effect of this is that the tube is now slightly longer which reduces lateral play. The reason shims are not used is because they are less permanent. Also they will only remove lateral play which is often not the only source of sloppiness in keys. That's not to say shims don't have their uses. I've occasionally made shims for the keys on some really poorly made instruments (Romanian tarogatos, Indian 6 key flutes, some Chinese instruments...). If done right swedging leaves no marks (you have to polish your pliers to a mirror finish) and is completely permanent.

Another neat trick. For rods with pivot screws you can put a bit or teflon tape in the pivot hole to reduce play and noise.

-Jdbassplayer

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