I had a very funny experience. For months, my Uillean Pipes would suddenly stop playing. There were brief pauses in my flow, even during a performance in a church during a slow air. After adjusting the pressure, either increasing it or pausing the pressure and returning it to normal, the chanter played again. For a long time, I couldn’t figure out whether it was too much pressure on a soft Reed or too little pressure on a too hard Reed end, which was preventing it from vibrating. I tried everything: opening the reed, closing the reed, moving the bridle, and considering whether I needed to cut the reed to stabilize the lip and to extend the lenght to the former measure because the octaves.
During the session last Wednesday, I had an epiphany. While sealing the bag a while ago, a spherical piece of gelatin had become stuck in front of the Chanter’s bag connection. Like a valve, this sometimes blocked the flow to the reed when the pressure was too high, and then reopened when the arm pressure was released. During the sessions, I felt a soft lump of about 10 mm diameter there. I pushed it aside with a flute cleaning rod.
Problem solved. 