 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: rtmyth
Date: 2014-04-21 03:15
On another site this was speculated about; is it likely to be practical. comments please.
richard smith
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Author: David Spiegelthal ★2017
Date: 2014-04-21 04:51
First of all, by definition one needs to use a thermoplastic (re-meltable) material for the 3-D printing process (I believe) and such materials are not the greatest in terms of dimensional stability after fabrication. Secondly, I'm not sure the process can repeatably produce the very close-tolerance curves of the facing.
My guess is: Maybe someday, but not yet. But I'm no expert on the process, so could be wrong.
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Author: jdbassplayer
Date: 2014-04-21 04:58
Are you talking about 3D printing? If so then yes! My trombone player friend has a mouthpiece I printed for him and he loves it. I have made clarinet mouthpieces before but they have to be refaced to be usable. 3d printing is only really useful for making specialty mouthpieces like for an Ab clarinet or something. Otherwise it is more cost effective to just buy a MP.
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Author: wanabe
Date: 2014-04-21 10:55
I hope you are remembering that those machines are 3D ''printers'', not 3D ''copiers'', big difference. You first need to input the instructions to the printer to get it to make whatever it is that you want it to ''print''. They are not unlike CNC milling machines in that respect. You can't just drop your B45 into the document feed and start cranking them out.
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Author: Ursa
Date: 2014-04-21 18:05
A copy of a mouthpiece that costs just 3d couldn't possibly be any good...
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Author: seabreeze
Date: 2014-04-21 19:46
Youtube has some demos of 3D printed sax mouthpieces played by Peter Broekhuizer and other members of the Aardvark Saxophone Quartet.
The soprano sax mouthpiece in this test seems more responsive to me than the baritone. Of course these are just experimental prototypes. Ultimately the chamber, baffle (or absence thereof), bore, rail design, material used, and the human hand finishing the mouthpiece will determine the qualities of the final product more than whether 3D printing is used.
In the interest of avoiding unnecessary ambiguity and false starts when writing about 3D printing, I think most technical editors and writers would prefer always using the capital "D,"as in 3D, to avoid the suggestion that the ordinal "third" is meant. Few readers will misinterpret "3D" as "third," (though they might read it as "three-dimensional") but the primary denotative meaning of "3d," by contrast, is "in third position in place or time." My first impression on reading the headline "made 3rd copy of mp" is that someone wants 3 copies, rather than 2 or 1, made of their favorite mouthpiece.
Post Edited (2014-04-21 23:11)
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Author: ThatPerfectReed
Date: 2014-04-21 22:00
The dimensional stablity of thermoplastics notwithstanding, shouldn't we be somewhat concerned that the material may not give us the sound qualities we desire were the same mouthpiece done in, say, core rubber?
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Author: David Spiegelthal ★2017
Date: 2014-04-21 23:53
It remains debatable whether the mouthpiece material, all other things being the same (which they never are), has any audible effect on the sound of the instrument.
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Author: qualitycontrol
Date: 2014-04-22 00:30
3D printing comes nowhere close to matching the tolerances of machining, which until the Rico Reserve came around, came nowhere close to matching the tolerances of hand-finishing.
3D printing would be great for producing affordable plastic blanks in a variety of specifications, but machining or hand-finishing plastic blanks is not as easy as with hard rubber.
Clark Fobes's 'Debut' hand-finished plastic mouthpiece is already a low $40. I would be surprised if there were any cost advantage to 3d printing blanks and hand-finishing them for a product similar to that, but for strange mouthpiece sizes or shapes it could be useful.
Post Edited (2014-04-22 00:31)
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