Norden Sackpipa Association of the Americas (NSAA) Forum Index Norden Sackpipa Association of the Americas (NSAA)
Jerry Revelle in memoriam
 
 FAQFAQ   SearchSearch   MemberlistMemberlist   UsergroupsUsergroups   RegisterRegister 
 ProfileProfile   Log in to check your private messagesLog in to check your private messages   Log inLog in 

Making a chanter... and tuning it

 
This forum is locked: you cannot post, reply to, or edit topics.   This topic is locked: you cannot edit posts or make replies.    Norden Sackpipa Association of the Americas (NSAA) Forum Index -> Norden Sackpipa Association of the Americas (NSAA)
View previous topic :: View next topic  
Author Message
noordung



Joined: 02 Aug 2011
Posts: 15
Location: Slovenia

PostPosted: Sun Dec 18, 2011 7:08 pm    Post subject: Making a chanter... and tuning it Reply with quote

After some time, I've returned to my second attemp at making a chanter. O.k., I've drilled the bore, turned the chanter... no problem... and finaly came to drilling the finger holes. Of course, I see sense in following the Yuri's advice - given on this forum - about drilling all the holes smaller, then tuning them bottom up, then testing the bottom one and repeating the procedure, etc. But... with the necessity of correctly "fine tuning" and preparing the reed to properly play with the chanter.... and, on the other hand, the necessity of "tuning" the fingerholes to play in pitch acording to the very same reed... it pretty much seems like solving a single two-variable equation to me. How do the rest of you makers solve this problem? Do you just take a working reed out of another chanter and then tune (drill) the holes according to it? It might be a bit tricky in case you don't have another chanter and a working reed... Or you just make a reed and then tune the chanter according to it... but this just doesn't sound safe to do. Or do I complicate too much?
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
Anders Jackson
Senior User


Joined: 28 Nov 2006
Posts: 142
Location: Dalarna, Sweden

PostPosted: Sun Dec 25, 2011 2:07 am    Post subject: Re: Making a chanter... and tuning it Reply with quote

noordung wrote:
How do the rest of you makers solve this problem? Do you just take a working reed out of another chanter and then tune (drill) the holes according to it? It might be a bit tricky in case you don't have another chanter and a working reed... Or you just make a reed and then tune the chanter according to it... but this just doesn't sound safe to do. Or do I complicate too much?


As I have never made a set myself, take this for what it is. A starter for a discussion. Smile

I only heard that they make all chanters with a drilling master where each hole is marked. Then they just drill and make the read fit the pipes. As all pipes are (supposed to be) the same, the should be a working reed to each set, once the drill size and position is set.

At least in the original drawings i bought for the modern pipes Leif Eriksson made for Dalarnas Museum in Falun, Dalacarlia, Sweden.
_________________
No MSN or ICQ. Only Jabber at <xmpp:anders.jackson@gmail.com>
Änd sorri får maj misspellingz, inglish is nått maj först language.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
noordung



Joined: 02 Aug 2011
Posts: 15
Location: Slovenia

PostPosted: Tue Dec 27, 2011 2:03 pm    Post subject: Re: Making a chanter... and tuning it Reply with quote

Anders Jackson wrote:

I only heard that they make all chanters with a drilling master where each hole is marked. Then they just drill and make the read fit the pipes. As all pipes are (supposed to be) the same, the should be a working reed to each set, once the drill size and position is set.


Well, of course, but the problem with a hand-made chanter is that also a tone-hole length counts and... well... I don't even have plans with the exact tone-hole lengths specified and thus tend to adjust the outer shape around the holes to a confortable grip rather than to the exact length of the holes - which I don't know, anyway. So I'm kind of forced to compensate with varying the hole diameters.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
texasbagpiper
Senior User


Joined: 24 Oct 2006
Posts: 352
Location: Texas

PostPosted: Thu Dec 29, 2011 2:21 am    Post subject: Re: Making a chanter... and tuning it Reply with quote

noordung wrote:
Anders Jackson wrote:

I only heard that they make all chanters with a drilling master where each hole is marked. Then they just drill and make the read fit the pipes. As all pipes are (supposed to be) the same, the should be a working reed to each set, once the drill size and position is set.


Well, of course, but the problem with a hand-made chanter is that also a tone-hole length counts and... well... I don't even have plans with the exact tone-hole lengths specified and thus tend to adjust the outer shape around the holes to a confortable grip rather than to the exact length of the holes - which I don't know, anyway. So I'm kind of forced to compensate with varying the hole diameters.


Their is a Czech website that has plans for an E/A set, along with an E set of Czech Duda pipes. I can't recall the website, but its out there. Seth
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message Visit poster's website
Black Rose



Joined: 10 Apr 2011
Posts: 44
Location: Minneapolis Minnesota USA

PostPosted: Fri Jan 18, 2013 7:46 am    Post subject: Re: Making a chanter... and tuning it Reply with quote

You're talking about chimney height and it doesn't matter at all. It changes the pitch yes, but you haven't drilled holes yet that means nothing, because you'll be drilling, undercutting, or filing open each hole to hit correct pitch and that will automatically take into account the depth of the chimney, so carve your scallops to whatever you feel comfortable with. Then tune the holes starting with all small holes and opening them up bottom to top to voice the scale.

The catch is going to be the reed. If you have a working reed from another chanter, that helps. If you have instructions for making a standard sized reed and it fits into your bore, that will do. Make it quack and shove it into the reed seat. Then you have to look at the lowest note of your scale and enlarge it until it either comes up to pitch, or it's looking way too big and still flat. If that happens shove the reed in a bit. You may also have to close the reed down a bit, but not so much that it feels weak and chokes off. Yes, it's juggling three variables at a minimum, plus the one that says the reed is going to change the whole time you're blowing on it and carving away at the chanter.

When you get to the back, thumb note, back E or D, and the hole is still very small and weak sounding but sharp, you may then have to pull the reed out a bit and/or lengthen the tongue a bit. The catch is, if you start with a bore size, and hole spacing/chanter length, and a reed that's fairly close to a known dimension, it's all juggling. Then you go back to the low notes. If they're flat, ream them out but stop when they get ridiculously large, and then undercut the top edge inside the bore instead to keep sharpening. If you over-ream/file a hole too sharp, that's a good thing usually. That means you can tune it with a little wax scraped into the outside top edge to flatten it again.

The notion of putting refined little recorder-sized holes into sackpipa probably comes out of using the recorder in the school system or something along those lines. But that's not very practical in sackpipa. For one thing it makes a very weak tone, it diminishes the ability to slide or use vibrato or bend notes, and it mutes single finger or semi-closed popping or faux-staccato. The instrument fundamentally moves around all day every day and every note drifts in one direction or the other as it warms up or moistens up from the time you start playing it till it stabilizes at some point, and then actually keeps drifting even then, only slower and possibly in a different direction.

About the fourth or fifth variable is blowing pressure. Sackpipa actually overblow the low E/D in particular, flat, not sharp. So you have to also decide what pressure you're going to blow the reed. A little heavier drops the lower hand but sharpens the upperhand. A little lighter, and the upperhand drops but the lowerhand sharpens. Finding the right blowing pressure is not a question of making the chanter tune so much as judging when the reed is making a stabile and bright tone without feeling it wants to choke. Then you make the holes adjust to the reed, not the other way around.

All the old instruments had very very large holes, even ovalled out holes. That's because they were made as I describe, and each hole was treated as a hole kit--an ongoing project--not a finished hole. Each hole was too sharp and waxed down to tune wherever the reed was at any given moment or whatever the weather or environmental conditions.

If you're using standardized synthetic reeds and a precision made chanter with universally accurate scallops/chimney heights, bores, hole sizes and spacings, well, then all that precision matters. But not really. Because even those chanters and reeds will vary a bit with heat and humidity and will need tuning wax.

I think it's more than a bit misguided to approach the instrument as if it were a sacred, precision engineered musical tool. It's more like a vague idea whittled into a piece of lumber that occasionally makes great music. But to get there you have to make it play great music each and every time you pick it up. It doesn't matter how good it sounded when it left the shop, what matters is how it is sounding when and where you're playing at the moment.

I'll hit "submit" now only to discover I should have checked the date and this is three years old and you've gone on to play the accordion instead of pipes.

texasbagpiper wrote:
noordung wrote:
Anders Jackson wrote:

I only heard that they make all chanters with a drilling master where each hole is marked. Then they just drill and make the read fit the pipes. As all pipes are (supposed to be) the same, the should be a working reed to each set, once the drill size and position is set.


Well, of course, but the problem with a hand-made chanter is that also a tone-hole length counts and... well... I don't even have plans with the exact tone-hole lengths specified and thus tend to adjust the outer shape around the holes to a confortable grip rather than to the exact length of the holes - which I don't know, anyway. So I'm kind of forced to compensate with varying the hole diameters.


Their is a Czech website that has plans for an E/A set, along with an E set of Czech Duda pipes. I can't recall the website, but its out there. Seth

_________________
Sigs are a waste of bandwidth
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message Visit poster's website
noordung



Joined: 02 Aug 2011
Posts: 15
Location: Slovenia

PostPosted: Tue Jan 22, 2013 10:52 am    Post subject: Re: Making a chanter... and tuning it Reply with quote

Black Rose wrote:
I'll hit "submit" now only to discover I should have checked the date and this is three years old and you've gone on to play the accordion instead of pipes.


Ha ha... I play my accordion alright! But still glad to read your post. Indeed, I have a few drilled blanks laying on my workbench waiting for me to start experimenting and try the tricks you suggested above. I feared that the forum was dead! Glad to see that also some makers are still on the forum.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
noordung



Joined: 02 Aug 2011
Posts: 15
Location: Slovenia

PostPosted: Sun Sep 08, 2013 3:23 pm    Post subject: Re: Making a chanter... and tuning it Reply with quote

I'm back to my saeckpipa attempts. I've never wondered that before till it got serious. Smile But, is saeckpipa normally tuned in natural or modern equal temperament? May sound like a stupid question, but all the few pipes I've made till now are completely untempered beasts by nature.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
Olle
Site Admin


Joined: 21 Oct 2006
Posts: 435
Location: Uppsala, Sweden

PostPosted: Mon Sep 09, 2013 8:34 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Natural. No bagpipes are tuned in equal temperament as far as I know. This is a drone instrument, after all, i.e. the chanter should be tuned to a scale which sounds good with that drone. Equal temperament does not, since all of the notes except the tonic will be slightly off scale (compared to the drone that is). Some more than others. The thirds and sevenths in particular.

Most of us don't think about this when we tune. We just tune the tonic to an external reference (another instrument, tuner or similar) and then the rest of the notes by ear, using the drone as a reference point. That leads to a natural scale.

Having said that, I don't think the old pipers cared much about this when making a chanter. The finger holes of the old chanter are huge, so they could be retuned after fashion or whim quite a bit anyway, both up and down. That makes the hole placement when turning the chanter (or carving, in their case) less crucial.
_________________
Info on Swedish bagpipes at http://olle.gallmo.se/sackpipa
More about me at http://olle.gallmo.se
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message Send e-mail Visit poster's website
noordung



Joined: 02 Aug 2011
Posts: 15
Location: Slovenia

PostPosted: Thu Sep 19, 2013 6:53 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Thanks, Olle! I will come back when I'll have some results to share.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
Display posts from previous:   
This forum is locked: you cannot post, reply to, or edit topics.   This topic is locked: you cannot edit posts or make replies.    Norden Sackpipa Association of the Americas (NSAA) Forum Index -> Norden Sackpipa Association of the Americas (NSAA) All times are GMT + 1 Hour
Page 1 of 1

 
Jump to:  
You cannot post new topics in this forum
You cannot reply to topics in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum
You cannot delete your posts in this forum
You cannot vote in polls in this forum


Powered by phpBB © 2001, 2005 phpBB Group