Interchangeable Resonators
- Thread starter jbtsax
- Start date
Modern rubbers, with improved compounding (didja know that rubber is really just a mixture of materials, folded over hundreds of times to meld everything together, rather than a single unified material - even injection molded rubbers are initially mixed up that way with the natural and synthetic rubbers milled up with carbon black, white pigment, sulphur and other stuff in horribly dangerous mills) might have alleviated the problem.
I do find pads on horns to be curiously antiquated, and have always wondered why someone hasn't come up with a better system. Fishskin pads are fragile, leather pads (particularly those on German clarinets are like balls of dough.
Back in about 1986, we visited a ICS convention where an exhibitor from Israel was showing his newly patented system of precision machined closures for tone holes on a bassoon. The seats and seals were both of precision dimensioned metal, with no pad or rubber to be found. The clicking of the "keys" in the "seats" was distracting to the player, but wasn't audible to the audience. And, the seats were tight as a drum.
My concerns were with the rather primitive keywork found on most bassoons (with the long levers and their imprecise alignment with the holes) would ultimately cause problems once the joints were twisted a few too many times during assembly and disassembly. But, it was pretty neat to feel it working so smoothly. (It didn't hurt that I could play the fag while most of the clarinet players couldn't.)
I do find pads on horns to be curiously antiquated, and have always wondered why someone hasn't come up with a better system. Fishskin pads are fragile, leather pads (particularly those on German clarinets are like balls of dough.
Back in about 1986, we visited a ICS convention where an exhibitor from Israel was showing his newly patented system of precision machined closures for tone holes on a bassoon. The seats and seals were both of precision dimensioned metal, with no pad or rubber to be found. The clicking of the "keys" in the "seats" was distracting to the player, but wasn't audible to the audience. And, the seats were tight as a drum.
My concerns were with the rather primitive keywork found on most bassoons (with the long levers and their imprecise alignment with the holes) would ultimately cause problems once the joints were twisted a few too many times during assembly and disassembly. But, it was pretty neat to feel it working so smoothly. (It didn't hurt that I could play the fag while most of the clarinet players couldn't.)
I think the main reason is that the solutions to the problem of how to make a better seal are too expensive or require too much of an instrument redesign -- or aren't a very good solution (i.e. create a new problem, like the loud keywork on the Padless).
IIRC, though, either Codera Resoblades work with the Selmer Padless or Wolf Codera had a version that could fit a Selmer Padless.
IIRC, though, either Codera Resoblades work with the Selmer Padless or Wolf Codera had a version that could fit a Selmer Padless.