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Re: Vintage, or Vintage Clone?

Author: L. Omar Henderson
Date: 2005-12-29 17:33

(Disclaimer - I can not reveal any specific details of composition or conditions because those belong to a client that paid for the information)
I may make some of the current sellers of vintage clone mouthpieces - not in a style and dimensions sense but the material itself - - - unhappy, but I can say IMO that it is near impossible to recreate the material or vulcanization process used in vintage mouthpieces.

Some of the reasons why:
The materials, latex used specifically, had a number of impurities that are not found in current sources of supply. With the advent of latex gloves the traditional sources of latex supply changed and the raw material had to become more processed than latex supplies of 20-50 years ago. Of course many of the older blanks used sulphur based catalysts. Some of these sulphur catalysts were mixed to give hybrid catalysts and the mixture ratios were not well documented. Sophisticated modern analytic techniques can of course document these abnormalities from pure compounds but another major factor comes into play - the vulcanization and curing process.

Mouthpiece blanks are vulcanized using high temperature, vacuum and pressure during a graded regimen. Cooling and curing steps follow. Historical research has uncovered some of the conditions used to create the classic mouthpiece blanks (with no true accuracy however). The problem of course is that impurities in the raw materials alter the vulcanization process. The number and type of impurities as well as properties of the latex itself can have a significant effect on the vulcanization process and activity of the catalysts which cascades down to the cooling and curing steps. Timing of all these steps is critical and has a significant effect on the qualities of the finished blank. Records of timing and curing for classic blanks are obscure and incompletely documented. The configuration of the equipment has also changed - another variable.

With the advent of computer controlled vulcanization "eggs" now used as the industry standard all the parameters can be precisely controlled and approximations of "classic" parameters can be used to create "somewhat like" products but not a clone with the exact properties of the parent. It is also difficult to conduct aging experiments but there are definitely changes in the molecular structure in the vulcanized rubber over time.
L. Omar Henderson

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Vintage, or Vintage Clone? new

Brenda Siewert

2005-12-29 15:16