Pat Sky practice set US only.

David

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Payday, Piping, Percussion and Poetry- the 4 best Ps

I saw that. Why the metal tube in Hole 6? Does Pat do that?

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Richard Cook
1978 Quinn uilleann pipes
1945 Starck Highland pipes
Goldie Low D whistle

He does - it has a similar function like the marmorka on gaida chanters, to create more chimney height and thus simulate greater wall thickness for that fingerhole.

I saw that on one of his chanters a few years ago, and e-mailed him about it. He said he added the tubing rather than simply starting with a smaller hole. He didn't say why, he just said he did it that way.

Years before this, I did the same thing on a D. Williams D chanter and found that it helped the E's, they really shifted between octaves. I can't remember which was sharp and which was flat (I believe the 2nd octave E was quite sharp), but making the hole smaller with the bit of tubing really helped. The piece was quite thin and I shaped it to make the vent smaller, then sanded the edges and wound it with waxed thread to hold it in place - harmless & removable if needed.

I had the notion after seeing a photo of a Taylor chanter that had some sort of insert in the same hole, for similar reasons, I guessed.

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It's true that you'll catch more flies with honey than vinegar - but a big, steaming pile works best of all.

Roberts half set in D - US only.

David

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Payday, Piping, Percussion and Poetry- the 4 best Ps

Interesting.

In my experience E is usually sharper in the low octave and flatter in the 2nd octave.

Baroque flute makers had various things, putting a slight bulge in the bore near a finger-hole, or inserting a tiny tapered reamer inside to cut away the edge of the chimney on the inside, or angling the finger-holes, to correct various tuning issues between the registers.

I don't know of them inserting a tube to increase chimney height, my impression is that they would do the opposite, start with the wall-thickness that gave the deepest-necessary chimney, then cut away the chimneys on the other holes.

Are there old chanters with increased thickness around the E holes? That's what Hungarian and Romanian chanters do, rather than insert a tube, for the mormorka.

_________________
Richard Cook
1978 Quinn uilleann pipes
1945 Starck Highland pipes
Goldie Low D whistle

Wooff full set US only, relisted yet again.

David

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Payday, Piping, Percussion and Poetry- the 4 best Ps

Sorry - you are correct (I was not sure)...I checked it last night. The low E is, without the insert very, very sharp - like 35-40 cents sharp and just sounds terrible. At the same time, the high E is more or less where it should be (per tuner), around 5 cents sharp.

But with the insert, the low E drops into place and the high E remains about where it should be, maybe slightly flatter (than w/o the insert).

The hole is roughly 5 mm without the insert and it reduces it to about 4 mm.

_________________
It's true that you'll catch more flies with honey than vinegar - but a big, steaming pile works best of all.

Sorry - you are correct (I was not sure)...I checked it last night. The low E is, without the insert very, very sharp - like 35-40 cents sharp and just sounds terrible. At the same time, the high E is more or less where it should be (per tuner), around 5 cents sharp.

But with the insert, the low E drops into place and the high E remains about where it should be, maybe slightly flatter (than w/o the insert).

The hole is roughly 5 mm without the insert and it reduces it to about 4 mm.

_________________
It's true that you'll catch more flies with honey than vinegar - but a big, steaming pile works best of all.

Yes that makes sense, on every D chanter I've had there's around a 20 cent difference between Low E and High E.

For sure there are numerous ways around it. I've seen many pipers have their whole 2nd octave tuned flatter than I do, then High F# is too flat so they use a different fingering to bring it up.

On my chanter not only is High E a hair sharp but so is High A. My High F# and High G are bang-on. I've got into the habit of "shading" Low E, as well as backing off on the pressure a bit, while for High E I give it a little extra pressure.

It's cool how well that tube works to fix that E problem.

_________________
Richard Cook
1978 Quinn uilleann pipes
1945 Starck Highland pipes
Goldie Low D whistle