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Re: Which Pad Material Seals Best in Cold Weather

Author: clarnibass
Date: 2019-01-15 09:01

I can't say any type of pad was better or worse in cold weather. I've played outside at about 5-10C but not enough to have very meaningful statistics (i.e. never had a problem with a pad as a result).

Leather or bladder covered felt pads, even if the cover is treated to be waterproof, can eventually swell to the point of not sealing. Here is an example where I happened to me. Bass clarinet started having some weird intermittent problems (upper clarion slightly hard to play). It was during a tour so I didn't play a lot other than the concerts themselves. Then during one of the concerts it started happening and the clarion became harder and harder the more I played. It was one of the pads that was swelling while I was playing from humidity.

Winter might not be the same everywhere, but here, it is mostly pretty cold and dry, so there's far more condensation, which is likely what caused this. So I'd say pads that can have that happen are probably less reliable in the "winter"... in general.

On the other hand, I've only had this happen with one pad on my bass clarinet and I had it for over ten years at the time. Now, almost five years later, never had this with another pad. I have seen a bunch of swollen pads that needed to be replaced on others' instruments, but can't really know if "winter" accelerated it.

Re synthetic pads such as Valentino or Omni, I have only tried those first time about ten years ago (less with the Valentino models that came out after that). I don't know if that is enough time for meaningful statistics, but I haven't seen one change like that. It's very rare that I need to readjust a synthetic pad I installed and most of the time it's from the key slightly moving. The very few times it seemed to be the pad, it looked like it moved inside the key cup, because the shape wasn't deformed.
I have seen tones of leaking synthetic pads (that others installed) but nothing ever suggested it wasn't a bad installation in the first place that was the issue.

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