I happen to be reeding a Williams concert chanter which is with a set of Hunter drones I’m putting back into shape. I’m doing OK with it but it seems to have a tendency to break on back D and have a pretty sharp high B. Everything else is fine. throat is about 5.2, bell 12.9. using bought tubing at 54mm (i know I know but rolling one up doesn’t seem to help with back D) with quite a small eye and 13.2mm slip. By my standards the reed is really quite long. Using a smaller staple seems just to push the pitch up too much.
Anyone have a foolproof method? It’s playing great but would like to bring the high B down. The previous reed is a bit Finbar Furey but also has issues.
These problems are quite common in Williams chanters. If using a rolled steeple brings the second octave B into better shape i would stick with the rolled steeple.
Regarding the back D. Try increasing your sanding cylinder by 10mm. I have found this to cure these problems in the past
Spoke to Alan B about it too, haven’t time now to go into details but I’ve basically sorted the back D and the high B is OK. Will post the dimensions I used later.
I dont know much about Williams chanters and reeding them, but the describtion about the sharp high b and tendecy to break at back sounds very similar with the Spillanne chanter I have had the last 19 years.
It is very easy to reed if you could accept breaking d and high b in second octave. (who would that!!!)
So Sam (maker of my new excelent chanter in d) could you be kind to describe the point of what Alan B have to say about a possible solution.
OK this is a bit weak - sorry - but I can’t really remember now what I did! The staple was bought tubing at 50mm with a medium sort of eye, the slip was about 13.2mm (wide for me) I think and I left the lips fairly thick by my standards. The octave I brought down by cutting the tails very wine-bottle, i.e. not much width left at all, also filing the staple so that there’s not much thickness of brass around the eye, also steep taper on the staple.
I didn’t go too thin on the gouge by the eye to help back D, but still thinner than most people probably. I scraped the middle of the reed (spine) at the bottom to get flexibility without killing the back D.
Then it was a matter of luck to get one that got the octave really easy so it plays high B and back D at the same pressure.
It IS still sharp on high B but tolerable. I have a tendency to get a flat second 8ve on our chanters which probably helps me. I don’t consider myself a good reedmaker, so perhaps don’t listen to me too closely!
Afraid I can’t really remember what Alan B said - though it helped me lots. Alan??