pipemaking is easy

Joseph E. Smith · Post by **Joseph E. Smith** » Sun Aug 15, 2004 5:12 am

Anyone who is interested in making pipes, by all means should be encouraged to do so. However, they also should be aware of the time, tools and skill needed to do so to the best of their ability. Someone who has never turned a length of wood simply cannot not attempt to do so and expect it to come out looking like a chanter made by a master pipe maker... it takes time and skill to accomplish that. Same thing goes for the metal work.

Cayden · Post by **Cayden** » Sun Aug 15, 2004 8:31 am

rorybbellows wrote: why so much negativity
Nobody comes out of the womb a pipemaker

RORY

Listen rory, i completely agree nobody is born as a pipemaker, but I know Geoff very well, and I have known him very well for over twenty years now. I play one of his sets since 1986. (That was at a time when , after I ordered the set, I was quietly taken aside by a high ranking NPU offical who warned me against pipemakers living in Australia.) I know the effort and struggle he put in to the things he does now at the level he is at.It doesn't come easy, it never has and he wouldn't have come anywhere near that if he hadn't had the skills he had when he started pipemaking.
I don't think it's negativity to acknowledge that if you want to do a good job at pipemaking there's a bit more you'll have to bring to the job than being fairly handy with a few ends of timber and a bit of leather and doing a bit of metal work. It's a job that requires a fair amount of different skills, insight in the instrument and an awful lot of commitment. If ytou think you have that, certainly go for it but don't start off thinking it's easy because if you do there's disappointment ahead.

rorybbellows · Post by **rorybbellows** » Sun Aug 15, 2004 9:46 am

Pipemaking is easy .OK maybe not easy, but not as hard as some people would make out !

This is the opening line to my original posting and I stand by it.

RORY

jqpublick · Post by **jqpublick** » Sun Aug 15, 2004 10:11 am

The OP here made me smile and frown and smile. Damn you for confusing me so!!

A friend of mine taught me how to juggle by making me throw the ball at the ground, bend over and pick it up. "Get used to it", he said. Nobody starts off an expert. Some may start off with more innate ability than others, hence be better at it than most, but they'll get slowed to a crawl by the learning curve. Every subject's got one. Some are sharper than others.

UP making seems to be a pretty damned sharp curve, so it's going to take some pretty damned sharp innate abilities to rise smoothly and quickly with the curve. Anyone can be taught to make pretty things -paint-by-numbers anyone?- but it takes something else again to make beauty. Getting a chanter sing in tune with itself and the world around it is quite the skill, and maybe one of those annoyingly nonlogical, intuitive things that makes the line between craftsman and artist a little too blurry for clear deliniation.

The thing is, noone's ever going to know if they can do it if they don't try, are they? Anyone can TRY to make a set, and hey, if some twenty-year-old with a lathe and a vague idea about reamers manages to make something that makes him (or her, or their assistants) want to make a better one next time, hey presto! Instant addiction.

As an aside, one of the best definitions of insanity I've heard is "Doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results." (Are the pipemakers reading this shifting uncomfortably in their seats? Heee-heee.)

Creating something like an instrument would -I'm going to assume-require slight changes and adjustments in each new instrument until something emerges that makes people sit up and take notice. Then the festivities begin, right?

I'd guess that pipemaking is easy... at the beginning. Like most things, it gets more difficult the more you practice it.

Okay. Done. I feel better now. Whew.

Mark

glauber · Post by **glauber** » Sun Aug 15, 2004 1:23 pm

rorybbellows wrote:Pipemaking is easy .OK maybe not easy, but not as hard as some people would make out !

This is the opening line to my original posting and I stand by it.

And you could be making them if you wanted, but you just choose not to?

AlanB · Post by **AlanB** » Sun Aug 15, 2004 1:45 pm

As a Reedmaker, I am often asked "Why is it that you do not make pipes"............

Too damn difficult, end of story. Ben says it for me, if they are so0 easy, why all the badly designed/sounding stuff out there? Note holes widened to tune notes instead of undercutting or working on the bore in critical spots, or necks thinned down for prettypretty instead of assign the correct wall thickness to attain good tone and tuning, or a reed seat so damn wide that the reed disappears down the throat gently whittling it out of shape over time.

A rather good maker recently commented on the bottom of my chanter where you would expect a little faux ivory gewgaw but where there is just a nice bit of turning, nothing fancy, the wood a little thicker than you might expect 'down there' . He shrugged and said 'there must be a reason why that was left like that'.
And I can say it wasn't just aesthetics .

Well I guess if your Stephen Hawking, time travels easy *shrug*.

Alan

rorybbellows · Post by **rorybbellows** » Sun Aug 15, 2004 2:17 pm

AlanB wrote:As a Reedmaker, I am often asked "Why is it that you do not make pipes"............

Too damn difficult, end of story. Ben says it for me, if they are so0 easy, why all the badly designed/sounding stuff out there? Note holes widened to tune notes instead of undercutting or working on the bore in critical spots, or necks thinned down for prettypretty instead of assign the correct wall thickness to attain good tone and tuning, or a reed seat so damn wide that the reed disappears down the throat gently whittling it out of shape over time.

A rather good maker recently commented on the bottom of my chanter where you would expect a little faux ivory gewgaw but where there is just a nice bit of turning, nothing fancy, the wood a little thicker than you might expect 'down there' . He shrugged and said 'there must be a reason why that was left like that'.
And I can say it wasn't just aesthetics .

Well I guess if your Stephen Hawking, time travels easy *shrug*.

Alan

Maybe the maker had just run out of ivory right in the middle of the postal strike

RORY

AlanB · Post by **AlanB** » Sun Aug 15, 2004 2:55 pm

Or perhaps I couldn't afford the 'deluxe' version but was ashamed to say it.
Though you should hear the Es off it, I don't know if the thickness of the wood there might have had some kind of affect there?? *shrug*

Alan

rorybbellows · Post by **rorybbellows** » Sun Aug 15, 2004 2:56 pm

glauber wrote:
rorybbellows wrote:Pipemaking is easy .OK maybe not easy, but not as hard as some people would make out !

This is the opening line to my original posting and I stand by it.
And you could be making them if you wanted, but you just choose not to?

I could only try but I,m not taking a pay cut for anybody

RORY

j dasinger · Post by **j dasinger** » Sun Aug 15, 2004 3:12 pm

DMQuinn wrote:

It's highly unlikely that pipes will be made in China. You'd have to have someone who knew how and what technology to transfer, somebody who would be willing to spend time east of Suez (where the best is like the worst), and someone who could communicate with the natives. Too many requirements. Really. What are the chances that you could ever find someone like that?[/quote]

Are you being coy? The only person in the world who fits those qualifications is YOU! Of course, I can speak Chinese, but I can't make pipes. How about you supply the know how and I'll be the "Forward Representative?"

james

Rick Hall · Post by **Rick Hall** » Sun Aug 15, 2004 3:25 pm

It's highly unlikely that pipes will be made in China. You'd have to have someone who knew how and what technology to transfer, somebody who would be willing to spend time east of Suez (where the best is like the worst), and someone who could communicate with the natives. Too many requirements. Really. What are the chances that you could ever find someone like that?

Are you being coy? The only person in the world who fits those qualifications is YOU! Of course, I can speak Chinese, but I can't make pipes. How about you supply the know how and I'll be the "Forward Representative?"
[/quote]

My feelings exactly!

What do you say Mr. Quinn?

Rick

DMQuinn · Post by **DMQuinn** » Sun Aug 15, 2004 5:57 pm

The very fact that pipes are not being made in China is proof that there's no real money to be made at it.

Douglas · Post by **Douglas** » Sun Aug 15, 2004 7:55 pm

UilleannFinlander

Those are very nice pipes. I would like to give them a go.

Actually my wife thinks I should make pipes too, and I do have the machining skills, but I don't think I have the ear for it. I think I would do better at Highland Pipes since I am more familiar with them. My beautiful kids take up way too much of my time anyway (which I'm glad about).

Maybe many years down the road. I need to learn how to play the instrument a bit better first.

Joseph E. Smith · Post by **Joseph E. Smith** » Mon Aug 16, 2004 3:45 am

Maybe the person responsible for the design of the Pakistani pipes could be persuaded to initiate and supervise Chinese production of UPs.......
or, perhaps...............no.

benwalker · Post by **benwalker** » Mon Aug 16, 2004 2:35 pm

Yeah pipe making...........dead simple. Made a set of pipes out of drainpipes and an old vaccum cleaner..... sounded sh*t. Surprised? :roll:
Seriously, those pipes made by those makers who can actually play them are in my opinion better then those who only dabble in playing.
How can you make a set of good pipes without knowing how to test drive them?
All those makers who consistantly produce quality sets are all very good pipers to boot.(Dave Williams may be an exception, but I'm sure he once played them....He's not a bad flute player at all!)