 The Oboe BBoard
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Author: HautboisJJ
Date: 2010-03-07 15:22
I don't usually overlap my reeds, but i would like to learn how after having played some very successful ones from a reputable maker who does overlap his short scrape reeds. I find the hardest thing about overlapping to be the fact that an overlapped reed when badly tied keeps on overlapping, meaning, the result is inconsistent. How does one tie it so that it overlaps but the blades will not move around?
Howard
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Author: jhoyla
Date: 2010-03-08 05:38
I can give you two pointers:
1. When wrapping, the blade facing you should be a tiny bit below the blade at the back. In this way the front blade "bites" under the rear blade as you wrap up to the top of the staple.
2. The overlap should be as small as possible - just enough to make sure it is not going the wrong way.
I remove most of the ears before I begin wrapping to avoid "optical illusions" while judging the center-line.
I wrap with a narrow roll of cling-film/saran-wrap to keep the blades closed before I position them onto a staple. I set the overlap then - when wrapping the blades firmly with many wraps of cling-film. The wrapped "V" grips the staple by itself, and tends to center itself on the oval tube correctly, without much need for judging angles by eye.
I drop the probe of a vernier caliper down the tube and then screw it tight, fixing the tube-length on a handy tool. I use it to make sure I don't go over the end of the staple (pencil marks are very unreliable since the cane can move on the staple as you begin wrapping. And did you mean the front, the back or the center of that pencil mark?).
I have a metal rule affixed to the underside of my reed-table (it slides in and out) and I set it to my wrapping length (73.5 mm). I place the cane on the staple and then put the whole thing onto the rule. One nudge from the back of my cutting block and the length is set correctly.
And while on the subject of wrapping - I thin the extreme ends from the underneath, removing the pith but leaving the shiny bark. I find that the cane splits less often in this case and the same result is achieved (a smooth transition of the wrap onto the tube with no cane peeking through).
Sorry to go so off-topic, but wrapping is something that is easy to do right if you just set up correctly. With gouged cane at more than $2 a piece it is a shame to waste it by wrapping badly - we make enough mistakes on the scrape.
J.
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