Old pipemaking woods
- mirabai
- Posts: 110
- Joined: Fri Jan 07, 2005 11:08 am
- antispam: No
- Please enter the next number in sequence: 8
- Location: Iowa
- Contact:
In attempting to use maple for an odd prototype, I discovered that maple's softness not only soaks up the tone significantly but effects the grosser acoustics as well to the extent that a maple chanter essentially won't "work" until you coat the bore with oil or laquer at which point it immediatley and totally changes pitch as well as tone. There is a domestic wood that is quite suitable called Mountain Mahogany. It is quite hard and looks a bit like cocus wood. It grows in the rockies.
Tim Britton
row, row, row your boat...
row, row, row your boat...
- BigDavy
- Posts: 4885
- Joined: Sat Dec 11, 2004 5:50 am
- Please enter the next number in sequence: 1
- Location: Larkhall Scotland
Maple chanters
Hi Mirabai
Next time you use maple, try deep frying it to seal / stabilise the wood.
David
Next time you use maple, try deep frying it to seal / stabilise the wood.
David
Payday, Piping, Percussion and Poetry- the 4 best Ps
- ausdag
- Posts: 1881
- Joined: Sat Jul 24, 2004 7:14 am
- Please enter the next number in sequence: 1
- Location: Brisbane, AUSTRALIA
Just want something cheap to practice turning, beading, mounts and all that. When tone is an issue, then I'll turn to better woods.billh wrote:Rather than waste time on the cheaper broomsticks (though I've seen a _few_ that were OK for making wooden mandrels), why not get some half-decent beechwood or maple? Those woods will at least approximate the denser timbers better than other 'broomstick' woods, and they aren't expensive.ausdag wrote:I'll certainly be cutting my teeth on broomsticks before attempting the more exotic timbers. What sort of wood are they in general?Kevin L. Rietmann wrote:Broomstickwood would be great for your homebrew projects - !
Cheers,
DavidG
Bill
Cheeers,
DavidG
David (ausdag) Goldsworthy
http://ozuilleann.weebly.com/
http://ozuilleann.weebly.com/
- ausdag
- Posts: 1881
- Joined: Sat Jul 24, 2004 7:14 am
- Please enter the next number in sequence: 1
- Location: Brisbane, AUSTRALIA
Re: Maple chanters
Does that come crumbed or battered?BigDavy wrote:Hi Mirabai
Next time you use maple, try deep frying it to seal / stabilise the wood.
David
David (ausdag) Goldsworthy
http://ozuilleann.weebly.com/
http://ozuilleann.weebly.com/
- billh
- Posts: 2159
- Joined: Mon Jan 05, 2004 6:15 am
- Please enter the next number in sequence: 1
- Location: Skerries, County Dublin
- Contact:
Hi miribai:mirabai wrote:In attempting to use maple for an odd prototype, I discovered that maple's softness not only soaks up the tone significantly but effects the grosser acoustics as well to the extent that a maple chanter essentially won't "work" until you coat the bore with oil or laquer at which point it immediatley and totally changes pitch as well as tone. There is a domestic wood that is quite suitable called Mountain Mahogany. It is quite hard and looks a bit like cocus wood. It grows in the rockies.
I had a similar experience with pearwood. Lacquer alone didn't do the trick for me (probably some grain-raising interactions even after lightly re-reaming), but lacquer + oil did. I hope to do some side-by-side experiments with different bore 'treatments' at some point. Oddly, another pearwood design was fine without this, but on that chanter I had used a proprietary wax mixture to lubricate the reamer.
Bill
- boyd
- Posts: 1381
- Joined: Fri Jul 20, 2001 6:00 pm
- antispam: No
- Please enter the next number in sequence: 8
- Tell us something.: Sets in D and B by Rogge and flute by Olwell, whistles by Burke and Goldie. I have been a member for a very long time here. Thanks for reading.
- Location: NorthernIreland/Scotland
Re: Maple chanters
ausdag wrote:Does that come crumbed or battered?BigDavy wrote:Hi Mirabai
Next time you use maple, try deep frying it to seal / stabilise the wood.
David
I've discovered in my time here in Scotland that they'll deep fry pretty well anything, even pizza, Mars bars, Snickers, ice cream....probably even the mother-in law and whatever else takes your fancy.
Well, you gotta do something like that if you're to beat the Fins and the Irish to top of the world's Heart Attack league table
Boyd
- Hans-Joerg
- Posts: 788
- Joined: Thu May 27, 2004 3:37 am
- Please enter the next number in sequence: 1
- Location: Germany, half an hour west of "Old Brunswick" (Braunschweig < Brunswieck)
Old pipemaking woods
I was asking myself something: Up in Donegal (and I think not just there) nearly every "town" has a bog of its own and every family have their "claim" to cut turf. Where the bog is stripped down you´ll find lots of old tree-"chunks". They mostly are fir but they are referred to as "bog-oak". They obviously are several thousand years old, have become very dense and dark-brownish meanwhile (lovely wood) and are available in masses. Has anybody ever heard of a set made from "bog-oak"?
Best,
Hans
Best,
Hans
- Thies
- Posts: 234
- Joined: Tue Sep 30, 2003 10:40 am
- Please enter the next number in sequence: 1
- Location: Östersund, Jämtland, SWE
- Contact:
Re: Maple chanters
But my guess is that in Finland it's not really the deep fried stuff that causes so many heart attacks. Even though junk food is really "en vogue" there ...boyd wrote:[...] Well, you gotta do something like that if you're to beat the Fins and the Irish to top of the world's Heart Attack league table
Re: Old pipemaking woods
During the early 80s Tom White made a flute out of bog oak. I don't think he tried a chanter or any other part of the pipes. He may have though.Hans-Joerg wrote: Has anybody ever heard of a set made from "bog-oak"?
Best,
Hans
Bog oak once trying does have a tendency to split and fall to bits. Bog Larch is actually the nicer (and older) wood you find in the bog. If you bring a lorry people are often happy to get rid of it.
- djm
- Posts: 17853
- Joined: Sat May 31, 2003 5:47 am
- Please enter the next number in sequence: 1
- Location: Canadia
- Contact:
My undersanding of the bog-woods is that they are full of holes, checks, burls, weaknesses. I know pipe-carvers (tobacco pipes) love the stuff, but that is such a small piece. You would need a long, straight, unblemished piece to carve a chanter, and I'm not sure such a thing exists.
djm
djm
I'd rather be atop the foothills than beneath them.
- Lorenzo
- Posts: 5726
- Joined: Fri May 24, 2002 6:00 pm
- Please enter the next number in sequence: 1
- Location: Oregon, USA
I didn't know it grew in the Rockies, but I'm not surprised. It also grows in Oregon, California, Baja, the Channel Islands, South Dakota, Utah, Texas, Oklahoma, Arizona, and Mexico. While doing forestry in eastern Oregon, I use to run into large groves of Curl Leaf Mountain Mahogany...hundreds of trees visible from a standing position. It's categorized as a weed by the USFS, as is the Juniper (these two trees often grow in the same areas). Because of it's density, we used a few dead broken branches for campfires. It burns forever and turns into coals that will hold overnight and on into the next night or two. Forest fires cannot even not kill this tree, regardless of it's small size (12-20 ft. high). It's a real survivor. You can't even kill it by chopping at it with an axe. The axe will hardly even penetrate the wood. The chain of a chainsaw will become dull and useless in short order.mirabai wrote:There is a domestic wood that is quite suitable called Mountain Mahogany. It is quite hard and looks a bit like cocus wood. It grows in the rockies.
I'm not surprised that it turns well since it doesn't spinter.
A few years ago, at one of Kevin Burkes parties in Portland, I ran into a guy who sought out stand of these trees. He used the wood for making violin pegs and tail pieces. He'd written and published several article on the wood and had lectured at several universities about it's overlooked potential. Once he found out I knew where a lot of these stands of trees were, he wouldn't let me go until I drew him some maps.
- tommykleen
- Posts: 1686
- Joined: Fri Aug 30, 2002 6:00 pm
- antispam: No
- Please enter the next number in sequence: 8
- Tell us something.: I am interested in the uilleann pipes and their typical -and broader- use. I have been composing and arranging for the instrument lately. I enjoy unusual harmonic combinations on the pipes. I use the pipes to play music of other cultures.
- Location: Minnesota, Birthplace of the pop-up toaster
- Contact:
It is my understanding that many tree species that grow in bogs grow rather slowly due to the nutrient-poor environment. Thus the growth rings would be tighter/smaller. Perhaps good for insttrument making?
Mind you, in many regions of the world where you find bogs, the tree species diversity is rather low.
t
Mind you, in many regions of the world where you find bogs, the tree species diversity is rather low.
t